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Interior Minister Nicos Nouris informed the EU Commission’s Vice-President Margaritis Schoinas on Cyprus’ needs and the issues the country faces in dealing with the increased flow of migrants, ahead of the presentation of relevant proposals by the Commission next month.
Following their meeting in Brussels on Tuesday, Nouris said he and Schoinas had a “very cordial and friendly” discussion on Cyprus’ needs in the face of the wave of arriving migrants, and the support it requires from the EU.
Nouris said that he outlined Cyprus’ positions and policies “that we would like to see in the new European asylum policy, which is expected to be discussed and hopefully completed by March, and specifically by the EU Interior Ministers’ meeting on March 13.”
Nouris also went over the island’s migration issue with the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), Luca Javier.
He also met European Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders to present the Cyprus citizenship-by-investment programme, in view of an upcoming relevant report Reynders is expected to table before the Commission.
“I believe that, following the detailed presentation and discussion, any doubts about the credibility of the Cyprus investment program should have disappeared,” Nouris said.
Earlier this month, a European money laundering watchdog has cautioned that a secretive investment-for-passports programme run by Cyprus was vulnerable to money laundering and fraught with risk.
MONEYVAL, a committee of experts from the Council of Europe, said in a report that although Cyprus had broadly taken measures to mitigate key money laundering risks, the risk of vulnerabilities in the investment programme had increased “exponentially” via real estate, the investment vehicle of choice.
