TIRANA, Sept 19, 2008 (AFP) - Albania is finally cracking down on a 'land mafia' whose illegal property trade has blighted the once pristine Adriatic coast and wrought confusion in city districts.

With the sorry state of post-communist bureaucracy, the trade has flourished with impunity, scamming some 15,000 families -- some who bought the same property -- and touching off bloody ownership disputes that have claimed 2,000 lives in the last 15 years.

'The Albanian government launched this operation, which has a broad scope in order to uproot this scourge,' Justice Minister Enkeleid Alibeaj told AFP.

Alibeaj said the mafia have made 'tens of billions of dollars' with help from certain officials in charge of registering land sales who he said had legitimised 'illicit transactions'.

Rooting out corruption is one of the main conditions for Albania to eventually join the European Union. So far, the impoverished country has only signed a rapprochement accord with the bloc, in June 2006.

The problem went public in August, when prosecutors indicted seven people, including three land registry officials, over a scheme involving false property documents and money laundering.

Scores of scandals have emerged in the past few months, exposing dozens of officials from various political parties as having been involved in different affairs, as well as municipal leaders or public notaries.

'Thousands of hectares were monopolised by the 'land mafia' who have used false property registers to prove their ownership ... and sell the land at exorbitant prices,' Albanian Agriculture Minister Emin Gjana told AFP.

Along the Adriatic coast alone, 'more than 170 hectares (420 acres) of forest lands, 254 hectares of pastures and empty grounds have been occupied on the basis of illicit transactions,' said Gjana.

In some cases, land or houses were sold to several buyers. Hundreds of Albanians have discovered the ownership of the property they bought or inherited was disputed.

'The same property papers are delivered to several persons at the same time,' explained Gjin Marku of the Committee for National Reconciliation, a group set up to combat violence that has been triggered by the confusion.

'Many Albanians prefer to solve the dispute with weapons', said Marku, saying that at least 2,000 people were killed in the past 15 years in armed disputes over property.

In one high-profile case, Albanian press reports said authorities reportedly arrested two officials accused of forging ownership documents for about 100 hectares in the popular tourist area of Shengjin, northwest of the capital Tirana.

Had the deal gone through, the perpetrators of the fraud would have earned 2.5 million dollars (1.75 million euros), authorities estimated.

In all, some 15,000 families in the country have been duped in the land sale schemes, Marku said.

Albania's land registry has been in disorder ever since offices were ransacked during an armed uprising in 1997, which resulted from failed pyramid schemes in which huge numbers of the population had invested.

Numerous files went missing from the registry, pages were torn out and numerous documents forged, said Arben Qiriako, head of the Albanian Mortgage Commission.

In a bid to update the registries, the government, with help from the World Bank, has launched a major project to set up a data bank in a computerised file system.

A law was also adopted calling for screening of all deeds and the annulment of any transaction based on forged documents or false statements.

The law foresees setting up a special investigative commission in every municipality to examine complaints from victims of mafia wrongdoings in real estate.

'Out of 287 files in Tirana alone, we registered 65 cases in which the same deed was given to at least seven other buyers,' said Qiriako.

A judicial investigation has been launched against 65 officials and local councils' deputies, suspected of forging ownership documents for thousands of hectares of the coastal land and in big towns.