Corruption in Cyprus

Corruption in Cyprus is a salient concern for people in Cyprus: As of 2022, 94% considered that corruption was widespread in the country.

Extent

As of 2013, the government of Cyprus had in theory made some progress in fighting against corruption, for example with the amendment to its Criminal Code in 2012, which provides the Criminal Law Convention on Corruption^{[citation needed]}. The supposedly strong and independent judicial system is neither strong or independent. Nor is it competent enough to uphold most of the legal principles it supposedly has adopted except for the protection of property rights. Critics would however argue that this display of competency is due to the reason that foreign investors do not consider corruption a pressing issue for doing business in Cyprus.^[1] However, a whistleblower protection law is needed in the country in order to ensure an effective anti-corruption measure. It is also important to note that money-laundering remains a serious problem in the country. In addition, corruption scandals involving politicians from major political parties are not uncommon and when these get uncovered, little to no effort in taken to pursue them. The usual “defense” employed by accused politicians, involves official statements indicating that “they know too much” and if their case is pursued, they will uncover dirt involving other political party members.^[2]

In Transparency International's 2023 Corruption Perceptions Index, which scored 180 countries on a scale from 0 ("highly corrupt") to 100 ("very clean"), Cyprus scored 53. When ranked by score, Cyprus ranked 49th among the 180 countries in the Index, where the country ranked first is perceived to have the most honest public sector.^[3] For comparison with worldwide scores, the best score was 90 (ranked 1), the average score was 43, and the worst score was 11 (ranked 180).^[4] For comparison with regional scores, the highest score among Western European and European Union countries ^{[Note 1]} was 90, the average score was 65 and the lowest score was 42.^[5] Transparency International's 2013 Global Corruption Barometer report shows that 72% of respondents believe that level of corruption increased in Cyprus over the previous two years^[6]

As of 2022, 94% of Cypriots considered that corruption was widespread in the country. The so-called golden passport scheme allowed investors with a minimum of a 2 million EURO investment to get citizenship, a scandal which triggered an infringement procedure of the European Commission and which led to a gradual "phase out" of the program in November 2020.^[7] As of 2023, persons entrusted with top executive functions in government did not undergo an integrity check for possible conflicts of interest.^[7] Revolving doors is a problem in Cyprus, even though post-employment rules were adopted in 2007.^[7]^: 33

Since 2004, Cyprus is supposed to have two systems of financial reporting, one for the President, ministers and members of Parliament and one for publicly exposed persons, but the sysem is not working, data vague and data collection rare (only every 3 years). Also, as of 2023 information relating to spouses and children has not been published.^[7]^: 34

In November 2023, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, Paper Trail Media [de] and 69 media partners including Distributed Denial of Secrets and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and more than 270 journalists in 55 countries and territories^[8]^[9] produced the 'Cyprus Confidential' report on the financial network which supports the regime of Vladimir Putin, mostly with connections to Cyprus, and showed Cyprus to have strong links with high-up figures in the Kremlin, some of whom have been sanctioned.^[10]^[11] Government officials including Cyprus president Nikos Christodoulides^[12] and European lawmakers^[13] began responding to the investigation's findings in less than 24 hours,^[14] calling for reforms and launching probes.^[15]^[16]

Notes

^ Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom