The top court in the European Union (EU) has said that Malta’s golden passport scheme is illegal.
Malta has allowed people to secure Maltese (and by extension EU citizenship) if they paid at least €600,00, bought or rented a property of a certain value, and donated €10,000 to a charity.
However, the EU Court of Justice has said that this reduced the securing of nationality and citizenship to “a mere commercial transaction”.
The Maltese government said it believed it could continue with the scheme with some changes. If it does not comply it could face heavy fines.