THE USE OF CITIZENSHIP BY INVESTMENT PASSPORTS FOR TERRORIST FINANCING

While we have regularly covered specific cases where international money launderers have used Citizenship by Investment (CBI & CIP) passports to move and clean the Proceeds of Crime, taking full advantage of their ability to secure identification under an alias, complete with bogus dates and places of birth, but we dare not neglect the artful use of CBI passports for the financing of terrorist activities. Cleverly managed terrorist financing funds movement is so much harder to identify, as if often masquerades as legitimate commerce, and compliance officers often only get to see a small piece of a complex operation, which history tell us does not require huge sums to finance specific terrorist acts.

I wish to draw your attention to the fact that terrorist financiers, who often come from jurisdictions designated by the United States as State Sponsors of Terrorism, are drawn to the five Eastern Caribbean states that offer CBI, due to the abysmally, and intentionally ineffective, due diligence processes in those countries, where approval, with its much-needed funds flow, is needed to cover national budgetary requirements. Terrorist financiers applying for Caribbean CBI passports often appear to be international businessmen, and therefore have an excellent chance of being approved.

Calvin St. Juste, Saint Kitts & Nevis CIU

The fact that our investigations over the past decade have identified individuals from Russia, Belarus, Iran, North Korea, Cuba and China being able to acquire CBI passports from the Caribbean states, is a great cause for concern. How many of those passport holders have engaged in the financing of terrorist organizations? We are particularly troubled by the large number of CBI passports sold by Saint Kitts & Nevis and Grenada, which are completely out of proportion to the total number approved. It is time that THOMAS ANTHONY of the Grenada CIU and CALVIN ST. JUSTE of Saint Kitts & Nevis should open their internal files, so that the proper identification of individuals linked to terrorist financing abroad, who hold CBI passports, can be made. Given the legal and possible penal consequences to them personally, of the facilitation of terrorist financing, do these two leaders really have a choice in the matter? It's time to aggressively pursue the suppression of terrorist financing through Citizenship by Investment passports.