Category: News

British passports are being issued without the words “European Union” on the cover, despite the delay to Brexit.

The new burgundy passports were introduced from 30 March, the day after the UK was supposed to leave the EU, but some people may still receive the old version until stocks run out.

One recipient said she was “truly appalled” at the change.

Dark blue passports resembling the pre-EU British design are due to be issued from the end of the year.

Susan Hindle Barone, who received her new passport on Friday, told the Press Association she thought the design should not change for as long as the UK remains an EU member.

She said: “I was just surprised – we’re still members of the EU. I was surprised they’ve made the change when we haven’t left, and it’s a tangible mark of something which I believe to be completely futile.

“What do we gain by leaving? There’s certainly a whole lot we lose.”

• Should the British passport be blue?
• Blue passport to return after Brexit
• Could a no-deal hit my holiday plans?

A change in the design of the UK passport has proved a rallying point for Brexit supporters, with former UKIP leader Nigel Farage describing the 2017 decision to bring back the dark blue design as “Brexmas”.

The decision to remove the “European Union” label was made in the expectation that the UK would be leaving the EU at the end of last month, as scheduled.

A Home Office spokeswoman said that “in order to use leftover stock and achieve best value to the taxpayer”, passports that include the words “European Union” will continue to be issued for “a short period”.

She said: “There will be no difference for British citizens whether they are using a passport that includes the words European Union, or a passport that does not. Both designs will be equally valid for travel.”

Source: bbc.com
Published: 5 April 2019

The Dominca’s citizenship by investment (CBI) programme does not facilitate tax evasion and avoidance says a report prepared by multinational accounting firm Ernst and Young, which was published on Tuesday.

The report noted that the programme, awards citizenship and that citizenship is not the basis on which a person’s obligation to pay taxes rests. Instead, the obligation to pay taxes revolves around ‘tax residency’, – a concept “often built around the degree of personal socio-economic links with a country.”

There are four main tests for determining tax residence under the OECD Model Convention: having a physical presence for a minimum amount of time; having a permanent home available; having a close centre of vital interests and having a habitual abode in the sense of being customarily or usually present. According to Ernst and Young, it looks to citizenship only if “none of the previous residence tests are enough to determine the country of tax residence.”

The persons who applied under the CBI programme to become a citizen of Dominica do not automatically become tax residents. Instead, as evinced in EY’s report, they must make a showing of physical presence by either having a “permanent place of abode” and being “physically present in Dominica for at least some part of the year of income,” spending “not less than 183 days in Dominica during a year of income,” or spending “some period of time in Dominica during a year of income, but spending a continuous period of not less than 183 days in Dominica between income years.” Citizenship is excluded from Dominica’s tests for tax residency.

Because Dominican citizenship is separate from Dominican tax residency, CBI does not enable circumvention of tax reporting systems such as the CRS, which are based on a person’s tax residency. The report affirms this first by indicating that “the [CRS] reporting rules are explicit in not using citizenship as a test,” and second by emphasising that “concerns over the scope for CBI to facilitate tax avoidance and evasion, therefore, seem to be based on weaknesses in the tax implementation rather than a feature of CBI programmes themselves.”

The report recommends care in ensuring “that countries and financial institutions properly understand the rules for tax reporting.” With its focus on setting apart citizenship and tax residence, EY’s report itself seems to be a robust step in this direction.

Source: wicnews.com
published: 23 March 2019

U.S. Embassy official said in a message to Calcalist that there has not been an official agreement on when the E-2 visa will become available for Israelis.

As of May 1, Israeli citizens will be eligible for a work permit in the U.S. provided they can commit to investing “a substantial amount of capital” in the U.S. and, in doing so, employ American citizens. The granting of the visa, known as the E-2, was approved last week after seven years of negotiations between both countries and is expected to come into effect in early May, a spokesperson for the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs told Calcalist in a phone call Saturday.

The level of investment required for an E-2 visa varies by the nature of the business, but applications must show how the investment will lead to the hiring of U.S. workers, according to the U.S. citizenship and immigration website. The E-2 program also allows investors to man key positions in their companies with people of the same nationality.

Israeli investors can either purchase an existing business or establish a new one in order to be eligible for the E-2 visa.

The path to Israeli participation in the E-2 program started with a treaty signed by President Barack Obama in 2012. However, implementation lagged behind as Israeli law did not contain a similar provision for U.S. citizens to invest in Israeli companies and obtain work authorization. The issue was resolved in June when the Israeli parliament’s Internal Affairs Committee created the B-5 visa for American entrepreneurs interested in building up their businesses in Israel.

Source: calcalistech.com
Published: 24 March 2019

St Kitts and Nevis’ Minister of International Trade Lindsay Grant, recognised the important role that the country’s Citizenship by Investment (CBI) Programme plays in the development of several key economic sectors of the twin-island nation. Attending the Caribbean Green Tech Start-Up Bootcamp opening event in Basseterre, Grant highlighted the areas that benefit from revenues from the island’s newest CBI investment channel – the Sustainable Growth Fund (SGF) – such as education, sustainability, infrastructure and tourism.

Introduced in March last year by Prime Minister Timothy Harris, the SGF was designed to provide global investors with the most direct way to the country’s coveted citizenship, while supporting socio-economic development on the islands. Although it has only been active for a year, the impact of the SGF is already felt on the islands. A recent report by the Caribbean Development Bank attributes part of St Kitts and Nevis’ economic growth specifically to the SGF, with revenues projected to continue to increase this year.

Grant highlighted that “revenue from the SGF is used to support sustainable growth initiatives, education, climate change resilience, economic growth, infrastructure development, the enhancement of medical facilities, tourism development and the preservation of culture and our heritage.” Prime Minister Timothy Harris had also praised the country’s CBI Programme’s “incredible success” during his most recent annual budget address, noting that it gave the Government the “fiscal space” to implement a series of initiatives, such as the Poverty Alleviation Programme that provides households earning less than EC$3,000 per month with a EC$500 aid. Several infrastructural developments that support locally-sourced materials, servicing and employment are also partly funded by the CBI Programme.

St Kitts and Nevis has been running its Citizenship by Investment Programme since 1984, making it the longest-serving and most experienced in the world. It provides eligible global investors and their families with a second citizenship of a well-connected, prosperous country, with the prospects of passing down citizenship to all future generations. All applicants are subjected to thorough due diligence checks, which now include digital fingerprinting – a premiere amongst Caribbean CBI jurisdictions.

Source: thestkittsnevisobserver.com
Published: 29 March 2019

The passage of a bill through the Lower House of Assembly Tuesday and the Senate Thursday will give the Board of the Citizenship by Investment Programme (CIP) the authorisation to issue licenses to agents.

This means that the Financial Services Regulatory Authority will in time no longer be performing that service.

The bill, called the Citizenship by Investment Amendment Bill, was first introduced in parliament by Prime Minister Allen Chastanet, who said by way of explanation that its purpose was to amend certain sections of the Citizenship by Investment Act No. 14 of 2015.

Labour Party spokesman on CIP, Ernest Hilaire challenged the bill but could not stop its passage through parliament on Tuesday.

Hilaire, the Castries South representative in the Lower House of Parliament, came out swinging against the prime minister for not explaining why the changes to the Act were necessary.

“I would love to hear the minister justify why those changes are necessary,” Hilaire said, asserting as well that in the absence of information the people might as well speculate.

Forced to give an explanation after Hilaire’s outburst, Prime Minister Chastanet explained that the changes to the Act were necessary on several levels one of which has to do with extending the time for persons buying into the programme to have a reasonably comfortable time to make their payments.

A point of intense discussion between the two was which of two entities – the Financial Services Regulatory Authority or the Board of the CIP – had the authorisation to issue an agent license to facilitate applications to the programme.

One of the amendments was to have the CIP Board deal with that instead of the Financial Services Regulatory Authority.

Hilaire was not in favour of that, pointing Chastanet to an act of parliament that gave the Financial Services Regulatory Authority the right to issue such licenses, a point Chastanet readily agreed with, but pointed Hilaire to a legal opinion from the attorney general’s office in November 2015 that said such licenses must be issued by the CIP Board.

The bill did not go through a debate in the Senate as it did in the House of Assembly however it did generate concerns from the Leader of Opposition business in the Senate Joachim Henry.

Henry’s main concern was the bill giving persons who gain citizenship through the CIP an advantage over persons who become citizens through the normal way as stipulated by the island’s Constitution.

Following Henry’s summation, the bill quickly went through the committee stage without amendments, read a third time and passed.

Source: loopslu.com
Published: 28 March 2019

The European Parliament urged EU member states on Tuesday to curb money-laundering in the bloc by ending programs to sell visa and passports, a step the multi-billion-dollar industry said would cause economic damage.

The recommendation is part of a hard-hitting report which also accused seven EU countries of acting as tax havens: Luxembourg, Cyprus, Ireland, Malta, Hungary, Belgium and the Netherlands.

The document is the result of a year’s work by the parliament’s committee on financial crime and tax evasion. The report has now been adopted by the whole assembly, boosting its political weight, though it remains non-binding.

Lawmakers said EU states should “phase out” as soon as possible all existing schemes to market citizenship and residency permits to wealthy foreigners. Currently 20 of the 28 EU states run these programs.

The economic advantages of these schemes “do not offset the serious security, money laundering and tax evasion risks they present”, the resolution said, echoing a report from the European Commission in January.

The industry’s trade association, the Investment Migration Council, said that ending the programs would threaten vital investments in “peripheral economies”.

Lawmakers upheld the Commission’s warnings on risks posed mostly by programs run by Malta and Cyprus.

“A good first step to combat intra-EU money laundering would be to get rid of the so-called ‘golden visa’ which are a gateway for money laundering and organized crime,” said Markus Ferber, head of the conservative group in the parliament’s economic committee.

In the report, lawmakers also urged the creation of an EU-wide financial police to counter the laundering of proceeds from criminal activities, which they estimated amount to 110 billion euros ($124.19 billion) annually in the EU.

They called for stricter rules and supervision to counter money laundering in the face of the series of scandals which hit several banks, noting that the latest overhauls maintained several loopholes in the EU legal framework.

he report further urged the EU Commission to assess money- laundering risks posed by legal arrangements such as special purpose vehicles and non-charitable purpose trusts, especially in Britain and its crown dependencies and overseas territories.

More broadly, deputies called for tougher EU rules against tax evasion and tax avoidance, saying the bloc should counter these practices in foreign tax havens and also in the seven EU states that “facilitate aggressive tax planning”.

Source: reuters.com
Published: 26 March 2019

Investment Migration Council (IMC) calls for EU support in raising industry standards for Citizenship and Residency-by-Investment.

Phasing out the €20 billion industry, as MEPs ask, would threaten vital investments and development in peripheral economies.

The Investment Migration Council (IMC) notes the European Parliament’s adoption of the TAX3 Committee report ‘Financial Crimes, Tax Evasion and Tax Avoidance’ earlier today.

The IMC understands and shares MEPs’ concerns about Investment Migration, however we oppose the Parliament’s call for Investment Migration programmes to be phased out. Instead we call on the EU to support implementation of better standards and oversight. Citizenship and Residency-by-Investment (collectively called Investment Migration) are responsible for significant investments in peripheral economies and are a force for good when managed effectively.

The IMC shares concerns on issues such as transparency, due diligence and the potential for illegal activities that can occur in the minority of cases when investment is abused. We support the calls from both the TAX3 Committee, and the European Commission reports published earlier this year for enhanced transparency, better risk management, control systems and oversight mechanisms across the sector, as well as enhanced customer due diligence and better information-sharing about applicants between industry and governments.

However, the IMC is disappointed that the Parliament has recommended that Investment Migration be entirely phased out.

Investment Migration is a €20 billion industry that generates significant societal and economic benefits, including job creation and notable contributions to GDP.

As the International Monetary Fund (IMF) recognised in its 2015 report ‘A Passport of Convenience’ and multiple Country Reports, Investment Migration makes a clear contribution to tax revenues. Likewise, the European Parliamentary Research Service (EPRS) report published in 2018 shows that net Citizenship and Residency-by-Investment inflow contributes up to 2.5% percentage points to the GDP in small EU economies, where investment is difficult to source.

Beyond Europe these contributions can be even larger, effectively creating a lifeline to foreign investment and development finance. Phasing out Investment Migration will effectively cut off a large source of investment for these countries.

Bruno L’ecuyer, Chief Executive of the IMC, said:

“We’re sympathetic to MEPs’ concerns and understand where this report is coming from, however phasing out the industry is not the right answer. Citizenship and Residency-by-Investment programmes are crucial to peripheral economies, as shown by the IMF and the European Parliament’s Research Service. The best solution is for industry and policymakers to collaborate in raising standards across the board to mitigate the risks of abuse. Our work on this is already underway – we’ll be sharing our results proactively and look forward to engaging further with the EU institutions.”

The IMC are in the process of finalising mandatory educational qualifications for Investment Migration professionals. We are also working with IMC industry members to provide better and more reliable data on our sector with research on key areas: National Security and Investment Migration; Societal Benefits of Investment Migration; Financial Crimes and Investment Migration.

We will share our findings with the European Commission, European Parliament, OECD and IMF to enhance cooperation and information-sharing.

Good policy-making is built on solid factual debate and constructive consultation with industry.

We therefore call for the IMC’s inclusion in the EU policy-making process. A rigorous, fair and formalised system for Investment Migration is in the interests of the individual, the country and the wider society, and we look forward to cooperating with the institutions to help deliver it.

Source: IMC Press Release
Published: 25 March 2019

Cyprus is preparing legislation to allow Britons already living in the country a grace period of one year to get their residency status sorted out after the official ‘Brexit Day’ on March 29, according to the British High Commission in Nicosia.

“We welcome the news that in case of a ‘no deal Brexit’ there will be a grace period of a year and we thank the Cypriot authorities for continuing to safeguard the rights of British citizens on the island,” the British High Commission said on social media.

British High Commissioner, Stephen Lillie, told the Sunday Mail: “British nationals in Cyprus should continue to follow our Living in Cyprus Guide and our social media channels, Facebook and Twitter, to receive the latest updates on Brexit.”

Around 70,000 British expats live in Cyprus, although this includes many who live on the island for only part of the year.

Lillie said that securing a deal with the EU remains the British government’s top priority, but until an extension is agreed and ratified by all 27 member states, the legal default remains that the UK will leave the EU without a deal on March 29, unless something else is agreed.

“It is because of the continued uncertainty and risk of a no deal Brexit on 29 March that my team and I at the British High Commission continue to engage on a frequent basis with Britons in Cyprus.”

There are three main residency statuses that British expats are entitled to: an MEU1 (registration for residents living in Cyprus for more than three months), the MEU3 (for residents who have lived in Cyprus for more than five years), while residents who have lived in Cyprus for more than seven years can apply for citizenship.

All Britons living in Cyprus should apply for either an MEU1 or MEU3 to ensure that they are lawfully resident and that their rights continue to be protected post-Brexit.

Source: internationalinvestment.net
Published: 18 March 2019

The government of Grenada has reduced the minimum investment requirement for the real estate option of the country’s citizenship by investment (CBI) program from US$350,000 to US$220,000.

The new reduced investment is only applicable where applicants co-invest in a unit, for a total of US$440,000 each.

Changes to Grenada’s citizenship by investment program (CBI), including the appointment of Thomas Anthony as chief executive of its citizenship unit, led to a strong fourth quarter (Q4) last year. Revenue was up by more than 25 percent in Q4, inclusive of 83 applications approved by the cabinet of Grenada.

Grenada is fast establishing a reputation as the most prudent and dynamic country for second citizenship investment in the Caribbean, or even the world. It has not been beset by allegations of financial irregularity, as has been the case recently in St Kitts and Nevis, where agents are advertising illegal cut-price citizenships with financing options.

The government of Grenada and the CBI unit is taking the lead in running a successful and prudent citizenship programme prefaced on due diligence, recently reiterating the importance of security and integrity in the program.

Minister of foreign affairs, Peter David said, “Grenada has one of the most rigorous due diligence programmes; there are checks conducted electronically, and there are also persons on the ground who would knock on the doors of applicants to verify the accuracy of what is stated on applications.”

“Grenada is not dependent on CBI; therefore, we do not have to compromise on security to maintain our program,” said Grenada’s Prime Minister Dr Keith Mitchell, last week. “It is important that we stay competitive, but at the same time, we must maintain the integrity of the programme. Any action by one country that compromises security can have serious consequences for the entire region; therefore, we must all be mindful of that.”

One of the things the CBI unit is taking very seriously is the avoidance of the so-called ‘financing walk away’ option. In such cases, an applicant is offered a real estate citizenship and asked to pay a deposit, with the rest of the fee financed. The real estate share is then transferred back to the vendor, who far too often, does not complete the construction of the project.

“We will not permit the sort of sham financings that are plaguing other markets,” said Anthony, “promoters of such schemes will be banned, and their projects stopped.”

Total amounts due for the programme for Q4 are also significantly up from 2017 as the total amount due in Q4, 2018, is US$51.5 million. Last year, Q4, 2017, the total amount owing was just $29.95 million. This noticeable increase, in addition to the significant increase in the number of approvals, is said to be primarily attributed to the changes in the CBI programme last year which coincided with Anthony’s appointment as the new unit head.

The Amendment Act 2019 offers a greater range of benefits, making the program a more attractive value for money.

In the first instance, the amendment will expand the definition of dependents as it relates to CBI applications to include parents and grandparents who are below the age of 55, unmarried siblings of the principal applicant and spouse, as well as children born within 12 months of the granting of citizenship.

Dependent children between the ages of 18 and 30 will not be required to be enrolled at an institution of higher learning and for parents or grandparents over 55 years to be fully supported.

The amended CBI Act also provides for secondary purchasers of CBI units in approved projects to acquire citizenship.

“Grenada has the most transparent CBI program in the region, publishing a report every six months on the number of files that were approved or refused,” said Sam Bayat, head of Dubai-based Bayat Legal Services. “It offers visa-free to China and an E2 visa to the United States. It’s quickly becoming the most impressive program in the region, and better value than European competitors.”

Source: caribbeannewsnow.com
Published: 20 March 2019

Shamima Begum’s family are said to have begun legal proceedings to review the decision to strip her of British citizenship.

ISIS bride Ms Begum was one of three schoolgirls to leave Bethnal Green to join the terror cult in 2015 and resurfaced at a Syrian refugee camp last month.

Home Secretary Sajid Javid revoked the teenager’s British citizenship in a move only permissible under international law if it does not leave the individual stateless.

It was speculated that Ms Begum, who is of Bangladeshi heritage, may have citizenship there but Bangladesh’s minister of state for foreign affairs Shahriar Alam denied this.

The Guardian reports that appeals against this decision have been made with the Special Immigration Appeals Commission.

Tasnime Akunjee, who represents Ms Begum’s family, questioned how the removal of citizenship could be proportionate when people who have “actively fought” for Islamic State have not faced the same treatment.

He told the paper: “The decision is wrong because it renders Begum stateless, it puts her life at risk and breaches her right to family life.

“The government have accepted that 400 people have picked up a gun and actively fought for Isis and they been allowed back to Britain.

“So how can it be proportionate for a 19-year-old girl who had a child not to be allowed to return, when the others have been allowed to return?”

Source: mirror.co.uk
Published: 21 March 2019