CGO: Messages from top EU officials confirm our warnings about the urgency of abolishing "golden passports"

The Center for Civic Education announced that during yesterday's visit of the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borelj, and the European Commissioner for Neighborhood and Enlargement, Oliver Varhelji, to Montenegro, "many important messages could be heard", and that one of the them that Montenegro must abolish the 'golden passport' scheme, i.e. the Economic Citizenship Program, which, as they state, "despite numerous warnings from the EU, still remains in force."

CGO says that the Government of Prime Minister Dritan Abazović, "similar to the previous one that did not fulfill this", that this Program will not be extended after its expiration, which is scheduled for the end of this year.

They state that no reasons have been presented why the program is not simply terminated, instead of waiting for its expiration.

"Going one step further, the current Government of Montenegro at the session of June 23.6.2022, 2.5 further simplified the conditions in the process of acquiring citizenship in this way, reducing the amount of required bank guarantees from a minimum of XNUMX to a fixed million euros, which is why the Center for Civic Education (CGO ) and reacted publicly," the announcement states.

They remind that their data shows that, in accordance with this program, during 2021, as well as in the first month of 2022, citizenship was granted to at least 291 persons, of which the largest number was given to persons coming from Russia.