As the coronavirus pandemic is currently affecting the economies of a number of countries all over the world, the Cypriot Government has decided to process the pending naturalisation applications via the Cyprus Investment Programme quicker in order to encourage foreign investments into the country and accordingly to increase liquidity into the market.
The Cyprus Investment Programme requires 2 million euros if the investment is only for residential real estate, which from that particular amount at least a quarter must be spent on a residence which will be kept for life. There is also another option for investing in commercial projects as well where the required investment is 2.5 million euros and from that amount minimum 500K euros must be spent on a permanent residence.
The Cypriot Gorvernment has introduced stricter rules when it comes to granting citizenships by naturalisation and the number is now capped to 700 per year. The government is trying to make the programme more credible and tighten the rules in order to avoid 'high risk' citizenships.
At the moment there is a provision in the law which states that citizenships given to foreign nationals can be monitored for a period of up to 10 years. Furthermore, naturalisations can be revoked, and passports withdrawn if it is discovered that the applicant made false declarations in the process or broke any laws in the country of the Republic of Cyprus.
Article originally published on 30 April 2020
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