Filenews 10 August 2021 - by Vasos Vassiliou
In the mansion bought by the Saudi friend of the President of the Republic, Mr. Nicos Anastasiades, next to the presidential residence in Limassol, comes back the organization Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), which fills it's report with photos and layouts.
The report also states that the previous owner was a Russian associate of President Putin, who had acquired Cypriot citizenship. As is well known, the naturalisation of the Saudi was also discussed before Parliament and was also the subject of a report by the Auditor-General, due to the fact that President Anastasiades and his family were transported to Seychelles by private plane of the foreigner in question. The house bought by the Saudi is next to the house that the President's wife had bought from the Archbishop.
The Organisation of Journalists dealing with organised crime and corruption refers to the 'golden passport' programme, which gave access to European citizenship to oligarchs and criminals and refers to specific examples of even Malaysian Joe Law. It also says the programme was terminated last October following a video taken by Al Jazeera journalists under cover in which Cypriot politicians allegedly offered to help a "fantastic" criminal from China obtain a Cypriot passport. At the same time, reference is made to petitions linking the president's former law firm to "golden passports". Reference is also made to the Saudi businessman Abdulrahman bin Khalid bin Mahfouz, whose acquisition of citizenship was contested by the Auditor General of the Republic of Cyprus.
As is well known, the Auditor-General had recorded, among other things, that the application for naturalization was submitted collectively by three brothers (one of whom was the owner of the plane carrying the President to the Seychelles) and three other persons. By granting Cypriot citizenship to the above six persons, citizenship was granted to 36 members of their families (spouses and children), 19 of whom were members of the family of the three brothers. The report also states that the property purchased by the Saudi was overpriced from €2.5m to €7.5m at time of purchase. It is recalled that the Auditor-General had indicated that, with the approval of the application, at a time when it was obvious that there was an over-pricing ('inflating') of prices, the State lost taxes and fees in the order of €1 million.
The OCCRP report also states that Mahfouz and five other Saudis applied for a Cypriot passport in 2014 and allegedly spent almost €19.8m in 2014 on commercial and residential properties in order to meet the requirements of the legislation. There is also reference to the approval of 6,679 gold passports by August 2020. These include 3,100 investors, as well as their wives, children and parents. At the same time, it states that through the naturalisation programme, a total of €6.6 billion was imported into Cyprus. In addition, reference is made to the 'Nikolatou' report which found that more than 53% of passporting cases were in breach of the law. However, it is clarified that there is no evidence that Mr. Anastasiades had any involvement in the process, although he adds that the President and Mahfuz are friends.
