Officials representing the five countries that offer Citizenship by Investment (CBI) Programmes in the Eastern Caribbean held fruitful discussions with representatives from the United States on the region’s progress in enhancing the governance and integrity of the Programmes. The discussions took place during a Roundtable in Antigua and Barbuda—the fourth of its kind in the past two and a half years.
Governor of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, Timothy NJ Antoine, and US Treasury Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary, Warren Ryan, co-chaired the Roundtable. Representatives from international and regional partners—United Kingdom, the European Commission, the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States Commission and the CARICOM IMPACS/Joint Regional Communications Centre—also participated in the Roundtable, as did the US Departments of State and Homeland Security.
The partners reviewed and recognised the region’s significant progress in implementing the risk mitigation framework for CBI Programmes, known as the “Six Principles.” [1] The Heads of the CBI governments agreed to the Six Principles at the first US-Caribbean Roundtable on CBI, held in February 2023.
The fourth Roundtable comes on the heels of the Heads’ signing of the historic Agreement establishing the Eastern Caribbean Citizenship by Investment Regulatory Authority (ECCIRA), in September 2025. All five countries have now enacted this Agreement into national law.
ECCIRA will be an independent regional regulator for the CBI industry across the five countries. It will set and enforce uniform standards for the regulation of the industry, as well as publish annual reports on compliance to enhance the transparency of the Programmes. It is expected to become operational in 2026.
The foregoing efforts have benefited from widespread consultations with stakeholders and partners to ensure strong governance and effective regulatory frameworks to safeguard the integrity and sustainability of the CBI Programmes. Of note, these efforts have been backed by strong political support, given the criticality of the CBI Programmes to the resilience and socio-economic development of participating countries. These countries remain committed to ensuring the success of ECCIRA and welcome the expressed support of international partners in this regard.
[1] The Six Principles are: collective agreement on treatment of denials, interviews, additional checks, audits, retrieval of revoked passports, and treatment of Russians and Belarusians.
