'Golden visa' schemes pose risk to EU security, Brussels to say

European commission is expected to sound alarm on their use to attract wealthy

Daniel Boffey in Brussels
Tue 22 Jan 2019 13.00 GMT

Brussels is to warn EU member states that the “golden visa” schemes used by Britain and others to attract the wealthy have exposed the continent to corruption and organised crime.

A report from the the European commission, expected to be published on Wednesday, claims the schemes designed to encourage the super-rich to invest in return for residency rights or citizenship pose a danger to the continent’s security.

The 28 EU member states have earned about €25bn (£22bn) of foreign direct investment in the last decade from a variety of different offers to wealthy people under which investors can secure the right to free movement in the bloc.

Bulgaria, Cyprus and Malta sell citizenship in return for investments ranging between approximately £800,000 and £1.6m, while 20 member states, including those three, offer residence permits for cash. Before her murder, the journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia was investigating an alleged abuse of the scheme in Malta.

Following the poisoning of the former spy Sergei Skripal, the UK Home Office announced it would review 700 golden visas issued to wealthy Russians under its scheme.

-snip-