The Irish Immigrant Investor Program and Spain’s Golden Visa have joined the list of investment migration programs suspending the receipt of applications from Russians following Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
BreakingNews.ie reports that Irish Justice Minister Helen McEntee has confirmed the Irish IIP is now closed to Russians.
“I have recently instructed that no further applications from Russian citizens will be accepted into the IIP,” said McEntee last week. She also pointed out that Russians accounted for only a handful of program applicants historically, and that not a single Russian had been approved in recent years.
Meanwhile, in Spain, where Russians are the second-largest applicant contingent following Chinese, Foreign Affairs Minister José Manuel Albares last week ordered the complete suspension of golden visa applications from Russians and even imposed a freeze on the consideration of applications still in processing.
More than a thousand Russian main applicants have received Spanish golden visas since the program opened in 2013.
Which programs remain open to Russians?
Suspensions of Russian applications have so far been limited to programs in Europe and the Caribbean. The maps below show which investment migration programs in Europe have explicitly barred Russian applicants from applying, and which programs remain open to the same.
In this overview, we are only including passive investment programs, i.e., golden visas and citizenship by investment programs; not Active Investor Visa or Independent Means Visa programs.
Residence and citizenship by investment program destinations still open to Russians, at least as far as has been reported (implicit suspensions may be in place in certain countries) include:
- The Netherlands
- Latvia (particularly surprising)
- Luxembourg
- Switzerland
- Monaco
- Italy
- Albania
- Montenegro
- Bulgaria
- Turkey
- Cyprus
The programs marked red are those we have been able to confirm as having explicitly suspended applications from Russians. If you find that any of the green programs should be red, please send us an email along with a source and we will update the map. We will continue to update the map as further information becomes available.
Outside of Europe, the only programs that have explicitly banned Russians are the five Caribbean citizenship by investment programs of Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, Saint Kitts & Nevis, and Saint Lucia. The EB-5 program, remarkably, remains open to Russians, as do the CIPs of Turkey, Vanuatu, Montenegro, and Egypt.
Related stories:
- Full House: St. Lucia Becomes 5th Caribbean CIP to Suspend Russians, Belarusians
- More Than Half The Firm’s Clients Were Russian: “We Won’t Serve That Market Anymore,” Says Ukrainian Founder
- Greece Suspends Golden Visa Application, Issuance, and Renewal for Russians
- Malta U-Turns, Suspends Russians, Belarusians from CBI and RBI After All, Citing Inability to Conduct Due Diligence
