The country’s defense ministry said a Russian man, identified only as a 24-year-old man with the initials MZ, was arrested after entering the factory in Gramsh, 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of the capital, Tirana, and taking photographs. . Two guards at the plant were injured when the Russian used what it said was a “neo-paralytic spray” while resisting arrest, the ministry added in a statement. Another Russian woman, identified as ST, 33, and a Ukrainian man, F.A., 25, were detained outside the compound and their vehicle blocked, the ministry said. “Three citizens with Russian and Ukrainian passports tried to enter the factory,” the ministry said in a statement sent to the media. “Officers guarding the factory reacted immediately, but in their efforts to stop the three foreign nationals, two of our soldiers were injured,” the statement said. The two guards injured by the spray were taken to hospital for medical treatment where their condition is “stable”, he added. Military police, army intelligence police and police and anti-terrorist police are investigating jointly. The Grams military factory originally made AK-47 or Kalashnikov rifles after it opened in 1962. After the fall of communism in 1990, production ended and it was used to dismantle old Kalashnikovs and other small arms. The Ministry of Defense’s website says only that the plant currently provides manufacturing services for the defense industry. Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama tweeted: “What pride for the military guards who neutralized three people suspected of espionage… Now let’s wait for the full clarification of this fact.” Albania, which was ruled by a communist government from 1946 to 1990, has been a member of NATO since 2009. He has strongly denounced Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and joined US and European Union sanctions against Moscow.
