EU lawmakers on Wednesday voted to limit so-called golden visas, as countries across the region clamp down on cash-for-passport programs.
The European Parliament vote, which passed with a 595 to 12 majority, aims to ban “golden passports” and set up EU-level regulation on visas that includes tougher background checks on applicants and the source of their wealth. After the vote, the parliament expects the European Commission to propose legislation to standardize programs across the common area.
“The commission has a duty now to act,” MEP Sophie In’t Veld told a news conference in Strasbourg, France, ahead of the vote. “The whole situation with the war in Ukraine has again put [a] spotlight on the problem of people buying passports, buying residency, buying access to the EU.”
Photo: AFP
Parliament wants the commission to come up with a legislative proposal that will ban golden passports, phasing them out by 2025 while regulating golden visas to ensure that investments flow into the real economy.
Lawmakers are also asking for stringent background checks, including on family members and on the origin of funds. In addition, the parliament called on the commission to ban Russian nationals who are subject to EU sanctions from all so-called residence-by-investment schemes.
European lawmakers also want to pressure third countries, such as Panama or Saint Kitts and Nevis, to abolish visa schemes that allow people who receive the documents to travel freely across the EU.
Thirteen member states have programs that allow citizens of non-EU countries to acquire an EU passport or residency permit in exchange for an investment such as real estate or bonds. Without any European-wide rules in place, the eligibility requirements vary greatly across the region, with the minimum investment ranging from 127,000 euros (US$140,254) in Bulgaria to 1.2 million euros in the Netherlands.
The golden visa programs have attracted about 3.5 billion euros per year from 2016 to 2019, European Parliament data showed.
In 2020, the European Commission opened legal action against Cyprus and Malta for their cash-for-passports schemes which grant EU citizenship to investors “without a genuine link” to the country.
Member states including the Czech Republic, Greece and Portugal, have halted the issuance of visas to Russian nationals in light of the war in Ukraine.
“We consider that operating investor citizenship schemes that systematically offer citizenship in exchange for pre-determined payments and investments, without a genuine link with the Member States concerned, violates EU law,” the commission said in a statement.
A Zurich city councilor has apologized and reportedly sought police protection against threats after she fired a sport pistol at an auction poster of a 14th-century Madonna and child painting, and posted images of their bullet-ridden faces on social media. Green-Liberal party official Sanija Ameti, 32, put the images on Instagram over the weekend before quickly pulling them down. She later wrote on social media that she had been practicing shots from about 10m and only found the poster as “big enough” for a suitable target. “I apologize to the people who were hurt by my post. I deleted it immediately when I
The governor of Ohio is to send law enforcement and millions of dollars in healthcare resources to the city of Springfield as it faces a surge in temporary Haitian migrants. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday said that he does not oppose the Temporary Protected Status program under which about 15,000 Haitians have arrived in the city of about 59,000 people since 2020, but said the federal government must do more to help affected communities. On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost directed his office to research legal avenues — including filing a lawsuit — to stop the federal government from sending
At first, Francis Ari Sture thought a human was trying to shove him down the steep Norwegian mountainside. Then he saw the golden eagle land. “We are staring at each other for, maybe, a whole minute,” Sture said on Monday. “I’m trying to think what’s in its mind.” The bird then attacked Sture five more times on Thursday last week, scratching and clawing the 31-year-old bicycle courier’s face and arms over 10 to 15 minutes as he sprinted down the mountain. The same eagle is believed to be responsible for attacks on three other people across a vast mountainous area of southern Norway
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
RSS