A series of investigations published on Monday (5 March) by the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), a renowned investigative reporting organization, show how access to the border-free Schengen area and EU citizenship are sold to foreign investors by European countries with little scrutiny and transparency.

According to the OCCRP’s findings, a number of the tax evaders and money launderers were granted residency status or citizenship by several EU countries, notably Malta, Cyprus, Hungary and Portugal, through investments ranging from €250,000 to €10 million in property, businesses, or government bonds.

New EU citizens under these schemes include the Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, three persons from the ‘Kremlin list’ who are believed to have close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, and several members of Angola’s ruling class.

Rami Makhluf, a cousin of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, was granted Cypriot citizenship in January 2011, four months before designated by the EU for bankrolling the Assad regime. His EU citizenship was withdrawn two years later.

“It is clear that due diligence procedures in some EU countries, such as Hungary and Portugal, have not been rigorous enough,” said Casey Kelso, advocacy director of Transparency International, who has partnered with the OCCRP to the investigations.

“Citizenship and residency are among the most valuable assets a country can offer an individual, but EU member states have not even been applying the same minimum checks that banks are supposed to apply to their high net-worth customers,” Kelso added.

13 European countries (Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Monaco, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, and the UK) currently offer the ‘Golden Visa’ programmes under various terms. In some countries, the wealthy can secure citizenship immediately. The exact number of citizenship or residency recipients is unclear due to the opaque nature of application process.

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