
Passport island
For the decade up to 2020, the Republic of Cyprus opened a route to naturalisation and citizenship by investment for non-nationals who wanted access to the EU – many of them wealthy Russians who had profited from the post-Soviet era. The magnitude of the phenomenon is staggering. Thousands of Russian, Chinese, and other investors became Cypriots by buying properties – and therefore passports – on ...
For the decade up to 2020, the Republic of Cyprus opened a route to naturalisation and citizenship by investment for non-nationals who wanted access to the EU – many of them wealthy Russians who had profited from the post-Soviet era. The magnitude of the phenomenon is staggering. Thousands of Russian, Chinese, and other investors became Cypriots by buying properties – and therefore passports – on ...