#citizenship by investment

More than half of about 3,000 citizenships granted by the state between 2007 and August 2020 as part of the island’s citizenship by investment programme were unlawful, the head of an inquiry ...

The government granted citizenships to 221 foreign investors without applying regulations passed by parliament in August 2020, MPs heard on Thursday. According to the auditor-general, between August 2020 and February 2021, the government granted 221 ...

The committee of inquiry looking into the now-defunct citizenship-by-investment (CBI) scheme will deliver its interim report to the attorney-general on April 6. Committee chair and former judge Myron Nicolatos told news ...

Parliament had no role in the approval of citizenships as part of Cyprus’ controversial investment programme, its director told an inquiry on Tuesday. Socratis Socratous said parliament staff had no ...

The Tax Department has been instructed to carry out strict audits of service providers involved in the citizenship by investment programme, Finance Minister Constantinos Petrides said in parliament on Thursday. “...

The attorney-general said Thursday the International Organisation of Supreme Audit Institutions (Intosai) had ignored a key provision of its own guidelines in a statement it issued expressing concern over the ...

The central bank of Cyprus (CBC) had no involvement in the citizenship by investment programme, but it intended to fine the bank that handled the case of Malaysian businessman wanted ...

The anti-money laundering unit (Mokas) received around 270 requests to check individuals and transactions relating to the island’s citizenship by investment programme, the majority after 2015, an inquiry heard on Thursday. ...

Former interior minister Neoclis Sylikiotis defended the decision to grant citizenship to individuals who ran into problems later on, saying they fulfilled the criteria at the time. “We couldn’t ...

In a further escalation of a bitter row over Cyprus’ golden passports, Diko and Akel on Friday accused President Nicos Anastasiades of not telling the whole truth about his holidays ...

President Nicos Anastasiades said on Tuesday the citizenship by investment programme will not be returning but other incentives will be offered to attract investors. Anastasiades was speaking after testifying before ...

Opposition parties went on the counterattack on Friday, saying President Nicos Anastasiades’ claims that he was a victim of a smear attack over Cyprus’ now defunct golden passport scheme were ...

Lawyer Andreas Pittadjis, who was exposed in Al Jazeera’s ‘The Cyprus Papers’ documentary on Thursday called out the international news network to state its stance on human trafficking after ...

The president’s former law firm was among those probed by the Bar association in the past without finding anything improper, its chairman Christos Clerides told an inquiry into the ...

Lawyer Andreas Pittadjis, who stars along with the former House president and an Akel MP in the controversial video released last year by Al Jazeera in which they all appear ...

Archbishop Chrysostomos said on Tuesday he met briefly and only once with Jho Low, a Malaysian national granted Cypriot citizenship in 2015, but that he was unaware at the time that ...

Archbishop Chrysostomos is expected to testify before the four-member investigative committee looking into citizenship by investment on Tuesday. Speaking in Paphos on Sunday, he said the contribution the church received ...

Service providers were the main problem of the citizenship by investment programme, a finance ministry official told an investigative committee on Friday. Financial director Kyriacos Kakouris told the four-member panel ...

The members of a panel tasked with probing the island’s controversial citizenship by investment (CBI) scheme said Thursday they are waiving any and all remuneration for their services, seeking ...

Former finance minister Michalis Sarris Thursday said using the citizenship by investment programme to focus on growth in the construction sector, which had a substantial contribution to the 2008 crisis, had ...

The Anastasiades government’s tendency to shoot itself in the foot, would suggest that very little thought is put into some of its decisions. The latest row, over the increased ...

Major flaws in the citizenship-by- investment (CBI) programme’s procedures were noticed in 2017 by then interior minister Constantinos Petrides who started drafting a code of ethics that would strengthen them, ...

The audit service said it will be probing a decision to raise the remuneration of a four-member panel investigating the citizenship by investment programme from €3,500 each for three months for ...

The committee of inquiry looking into the citizenship-by-investment (CBI) scheme will finally open to the media as of next week, it was announced on Thursday. In a statement, the committee ...