Ilya Shumanov, director of Transparency International’s office in Russia, says that the Russian elite is using Kyrgyzstan to remove restrictions on travel, doing business and “basically simplify [себе] life”.
“This may mean that Kyrgyzstan was chosen as one of the jurisdictions that helps to get a second passport. […] What is the risk for Kyrgyzstan? In what we see, how this scheme is also used by people who have a criminal background. Not so long ago, the US authorities exposed the Bitzlato cryptocurrency exchange, which was engaged in money laundering. But one of the founders of this exchange is also mentioned among the recipients of the Kyrgyz passport,” Shumanov said.
According to him, corruption may also be present in the process of issuing a Kyrgyz passport. He claims that intermediaries offer to buy a passport of Kyrgyzstan for amounts from 5 to 30 thousand dollars.
“I see from the Russian side that these intermediaries have appeared. Accordingly, they create a stir. And the cost of these services is an order of magnitude lower than, for example, the story of the “golden passports” of conditionally European countries or Caribbean countries, which they bought from 100 thousand dollars. Here, in the case of Kyrgyzstan – from 5 to 30 thousand dollars – this is such a “fork”, if we are talking about the preparation of documents on a turnkey basis with a high probability of obtaining this passport,” says Shumanov.
Azattyk journalists also write about Mikhail Zhukhovitsky, a financier from Moscow, who tells on his Facebook page how Russians can buy a second passport.
“Out of 400+ people, 50 have purely Russian full names and places of birth that are very far from Kyrgyzstan. There are some very well-known Russian merchants on the list. Look with your eyes, the information is public,” Zhukhovitsky wrote.
According to his scheme, Russians should first buy a passport from one of the Central Asian countries, and then get a passport from one of the island states in order to enter the EU countries without a visa.
In February 2023, a deputy of the Jogorku Kenesh, Dastan Bekeshev, reported on an online advertisement that offered Russians to “get a passport of Kyrgyzstan within six to seven months for 300,000 rubles.”
The authorities of Kyrgyzstan and Russia have not yet commented on these publications.
It is known that in just nine months of 2022, 1,631 Russian citizens applied for citizenship of Kyrgyzstan.
According to the laws of Kyrgyzstan, citizenship can be obtained in a general or simplified manner. In the first case, a foreigner can obtain a passport of the republic if he has continuously lived in the country for the past five years. This period is reduced to three years if the applicant has achievements in the field of science, culture, sports or has a qualification that is in demand in Kyrgyzstan, or the person has invested in the country’s economy.
In a simplified procedure, a passport of Kyrgyzstan can be obtained in one year:
- if one of the parents is a citizen of Kyrgyzstan;
- if the applicant had USSR citizenship;
- if the applicant is an ethnic Kyrgyz;
- if he is a former citizen of Kyrgyzstan.