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Pavel Durov

 

 

The founder and ousted CEO of top Russian social-networking site VKontakte has reportedly received citizenship in St. Kitts and Nevis.

An article in the “Izvestia” daily newspaper on April 28, widely cited by media in Russia, says that Pavel Durov, who recently left Russia, has become a citizen of St.Kitts-Nevis through its Citizenship-by-Investment program.

The Russian  social network founder acquired citizenship of St. Kitts and Nevis shortly before fleeing Russia amid a conflict with security services over data protection and privacy, a news report has said.

Durov, who was fired from his position as CEO of the Russian Social Network Vkontakte , last week, received a St. Kitts and Nevis passport by contributing $250,000 to the Caribbean nation’s sugar industry in February, an unidentified source close to the company’s shareholders said.

Durov’s brother, Nikolai, who worked as a technical director at Vkontakte, is also seeking citizenship of the Caribbean nation through a similar investment program, the source added.

St. Kitts and Nevis citizenship may be obtained by investing $400,000 in the country’s real estate, or by making a “non-refundable contribution” of $250,000 to the Sugar Industry Diversification Foundation, according to the islands’ citizenship-by-investment program website.

It takes between three and six months to process a citizenship application for St. Kitts and Nevis, said a spokesperson for Henley Estates, a company that handles citizenship-by-investment applications for wealthy emigration-seekers.

The necessary funds also have to be invested after the application has been approved, the spokesperson said, indicating that Durov submitted his application several months ago.

Durov, who reportedly resisted months of increasing pressure from the Federal Security Service to release personal information about opposition activists who use Vkontake, said that he learned about his dismissal from media reports last week.

He also said on his Vkontakte page that the social network will now fall under the “full control” of Kremlin-linked Rosneft CEO Igor Sechin, and Vkontakte billionaire shareholder Alisher Usmanov.

After he was fired as Vkontakte CEO, Durov apparently traveled from Russia to the United Arab Emirates, where he holds a long-term residence visa, an unidentified source said.

The St.Kitts-Nevis Passport Sales or Citizenship by Investment Programme has come under increased scrutiny over the last 18 months. In July last year an Iranian turned up at the Canadian Border with a St.Kitts-Nevis Diplomatic Passport which he claimed was purchased FROM A St.Kitts-nevis official for US$1Million. In recent months Three Iranian businessmen with St.Kitts-Nevis Passports were listed on a US Treasury Department Sanction-Evaders list .

There has been a few other high profile International Characters that have been showing up with St.Kitts-Nevis passports including another Russian Rustem Tursunbayev who is wanted for embezzlement in Kazakhstan.  Dr. Arthur Porter also a holder of a St.Kitts-Nevis diplomatic passport is wanted in Canada on a $22 million embezzlement charge. Teodoro Nguema  Obiang Mangue, the 2nd Vice President of Equatorial Guinea, is wanted in France on multimillion-dollar money-laundering charges; and Charles Edward Krasny Ergen, another SKN passport holder who allegedly faces a child abduction charge in the Philippines.