The European Commission has launched an official inquiry into violations related to Cyprus' and Malta's "golden passports" scheme.
This comes after Al Jazeera presented The Cyprus Papers Undercover this month, an investigative report claiming that the speaker of the Cyprus Parliament, Demetris Syllouris, and a veteran lawmaker had been caught red-handed trading European citizenship for money.
Syllouris consequently resigned and the government announced that it has cancelled a programme which offered full citizenship to rich individuals who could invest at least $2.6 million in the country.
After the report was published, European Commission spokesman Christian Wigand said that the EU's executive body would decide whether to launch infringement proceedings against Cyprus.
