An investigation by 15 international news organisations, in partnership with the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) has revealed that many Dominican passports were brought by people with “dark pasts.”The findings from the investigation are detailed in a report called ‘Dominica: Passports of the Caribbean.’ According to the investigation, Dominica has the world’s biggest “golden passport” scheme, earning US$ 1 billion since 2009, but the names of the people who bought Dominican passports have been difficult to obtain. “But, working with over a dozen media partners, OCCRP and the Government Accountability Project, a Washington D.C.-based nonprofit, have obtained the names of roughly 7,700 people who have purchased Dominica passports in recent years,” the OCCRP wrote in a report on the investigation. “Among the largest groups of buyers were people from Russia, China, Iran, including people of considerable wealth. Two years later they were arrested, charged with defrauding investors of tens of millions of dollars, and sentenced to prison terms. A number of them have also branched into real estate development on the island,” it said.

Source: The Guardian October 12, 2023 14:33 UTC