标签： Dominica

The Caribbean island nation of Dominica has taken the unusual step of revoking citizenship from Abolfazl Shamkhani, the younger son of the late Iranian political adviser Ali Shamkhani. This move marks the second time in eight months that a member of the high-profile Shamkhani family has lost their citizenship obtained through Dominica’s controversial Citizenship by Investment (CBI) program.

According to an official document obtained by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), the revocation order was formally signed on March 27, 2026 by Daren Pinard, Dominica’s State Minister. Dominican authorities have formally accused Abolfazl of failing to disclose critical material information when he secured citizenship through the CBI pathway back in 200, applying under the false alias “Sami Hayek”. Under local regulations, Abolfazl retains the right to file a formal request for an official inquiry into the revocation order within a 25-day window from the notification date.

This action follows a nearly identical decision taken against Abolfazl’s older brother, Hossein Shamkhani, who was stripped of his Dominican citizenship back in August 2025. As first reported by Dominica News Online at the time, Hossein had also obtained his citizenship through the same investment program operating under an assumed name, “Hugo Hayek”. Just weeks before Hossein’s citizenship was revoked, Western governments had imposed sweeping sanctions on him, alleging that he oversaw a multibillion-dollar transnational oil smuggling network that generates illicit revenue for both the Iranian and Russian governments.

The U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has publicly outlined that members of the Shamkhani family systematically use investment-based citizenship programs to obtain second passports, allowing them to hide their direct connections to Iran while carrying out large-scale international commercial activities that violate global sanctions regimes.

An independent OCCRP investigation published in March 2026 uncovered that the two brothers collectively own at least four high-end luxury villas in Dubai, with a combined estimated value of nearly 29 million U.S. dollars. All of these properties are registered under the false Dominican aliases the brothers used to obtain their citizenship. Cross-referenced corporate records also link the alias “Sami Hayek” to a Cyprus-based investment fund, while both brothers share ties to a Turkish chemical manufacturing company that was later added to OFAC’s sanctions list.

On March 6, 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice filed civil forfeiture complaints seeking to seize more than 15.3 million U.S. dollars in assets that prosecutors have linked directly to the Shamkhani network. Court documents name Abolfazl as the manager of multiple corporate entities tied to his older brother’s sanctioned operations, though Abolfazl himself has not yet been personally sanctioned or criminally charged by U.S. authorities.

In a policy shift implemented just days before Abolfazl’s revocation order was signed, Dominica moved to suspend all new citizenship applications from Iranian nationals through its CBI program, with the new rule taking effect on March 24. Under the updated policy, Iranian nationals are only eligible to apply for CBI citizenship if they have maintained residency outside Iran for a minimum of 10 consecutive years, hold no tangible assets within Iranian borders, and have not conducted any commercial activity with Iranian entities over that period.

Since June 2024, Dominican authorities have revoked a total of 68 CBI passports on the grounds of fraud or intentional misrepresentation on applications. Data shows that Iranian applicants account for six percent of these revocation cases.

Dominica’s CBI program, which grants citizenship in exchange for qualifying investment into the country, has recently faced growing international pressure and heightened scrutiny from both the United States and the European Union. In response to concerns over misuse of the program for illicit activity, Washington has implemented new visa restrictions on Dominican citizens traveling to the United States, while Brussels has issued formal warnings that the operation of the program as currently structured could lead to Dominica being removed from the EU’s visa-free travel scheme.

On an official visit to Honduras’ capital Tegucigalpa, Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) Director General Muhammad Ibrahim has reconfirmed the intergovernmental organization’s unwavering commitment to advancing the Central American nation’s agricultural development, following high-level discussions with top Honduran government leaders.

Invited to the country by Honduran President Nasry “Tito” Asfura, Ibrahim’s visit comes at a pivotal moment for Honduras, which has identified its agricultural sector as a core engine for broad-based economic growth and improved social prosperity, especially for rural populations. The talks centered on two core priorities: strengthening the country’s farming industry and building more robust, inclusive national food systems.

During their meeting at the Presidential Palace, Ibrahim laid out IICA’s full readiness to deliver targeted technical assistance to drive the modernization of Honduras’ agricultural sector. The two sides explored multiple pathways for IICA support, including technical knowledge sharing, skills training programs for local producers, policy advisory services, and cross-border resource mobilization to reshape the country’s food systems for greater sustainability and equity.

IICA Director General also updated President Asfura on the institute’s ongoing global and regional work to integrate cutting-edge science, innovative practices, and digital technology into agricultural production, with the goal of building more climate-resilient food systems. He emphasized that these initiatives align directly with the Honduran government’s national strategic goals: eradicating food insecurity, improving public nutrition outcomes, and strengthening the country’s overall food sovereignty.

Cross-border agricultural threats emerged as another key topic on the meeting’s agenda. The leaders highlighted the urgent need for coordinated action to combat transboundary pests and diseases that threaten key Honduran export and staple crops, including New World Screwworm in cattle herds, Fusarium Tropical Race 4 (TR4) that impacts banana plantations, avian influenza, and African Swine Fever. Both sides agreed that deepened collaboration in biosecurity monitoring and response is critical to protecting Honduras’ agricultural output and rural livelihoods.

Climate-related environmental challenges, particularly the prolonged dry conditions driven by the El Niño weather pattern and their severe impact on domestic food production, also took up significant space in the discussions. Ibrahim noted that IICA already maintains an active partnership with the Honduran government to address these impacts, including the rollout of targeted incentive programs known locally as “bonos”, which support smallholder and commercial producers to adopt climate-smart technologies, expand sustainable coffee production, and improve livestock farming practices. According to the IICA statement, President Asfura expressed strong enthusiasm for the institute to continue expanding this successful program.

The talks also covered concrete, actionable steps to mitigate drought impacts, such as upgrading national irrigation infrastructure, expanding smallholder access to high-quality adapted seeds and affordable fertilizers, and improving seasonal planting cycle planning to align with shifting rainfall patterns. President Asfura also shared his strong support for a proposal to construct a national seed processing facility, which would guarantee a stable, reliable supply of high-quality seeds for Honduran producers, and backed Ibrahim’s ongoing work to strengthen the country’s entire agrifood value chain. President Asfura’s Chief of Staff, Juan Carlos García, was in attendance for the high-level discussions.

Following his meeting with President Asfura, Ibrahim held separate working talks with Moisés Abraham Molina, Honduras’ Secretary of Agriculture and Livestock (SAG). Their discussion focused on expanding existing technical cooperation frameworks and scaling up resource mobilization efforts to directly benefit local smallholder and family farmers. The two leaders also reviewed potential new agricultural development initiatives that integrate sustainable management of Honduras’ abundant forest resources, and finalized coordinated preparedness plans for the drought expected to impact the country in the coming months.

Against the backdrop of the recently concluded 9th Meeting of the Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on Sustainable Development in Santiago, Chile, senior representatives from the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and the British Virgin Islands (BVI) held a critical bilateral discussion focused on accelerating sustainable development across the region. The meeting brought together Benito Wheatley, BVI Special Envoy and Vice Chair of ECLAC’s 40th Session, and ECLAC Executive Secretary José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, as part of ECLAC’s ongoing cross-regional engagement work.

According to an official press statement released by the BVI government, both leaders converged on a shared urgent message: global progress toward the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the region is severely off track, with just 19% of targets currently implemented. With only four years remaining until the 2030 deadline for full SDG adoption, the pair emphasized that immediate, coordinated action is required to close the existing gap.

Wheatley opened the discussion by commending ECLAC and Salazar-Xirinachs for the body’s consistent, targeted focus on addressing persistent regional development gaps and rolling out inclusive productive development strategies. He noted that when these frameworks are adopted and adapted by national governments across Latin America and the Caribbean, they can unlock transformative, tangible economic and social progress that benefits marginalized and vulnerable communities across the region.

The BVI envoy also went on to stress the growing importance of expanding technical cooperation across the Latin America and Caribbean region, particularly in three high-priority areas: climate and disaster resilience, cross-border investment, and accessible technology transfer. He highlighted that most regional economies are operating with extremely constrained fiscal space, driven primarily by heavy national debt loads and repeated emergency spending required to respond to unforeseen external shocks. In this context, targeted investment has become one of the most critical tools for sustaining long-term, inclusive growth across the subregion, he added.

Responding to Wheatley’s remarks, Salazar-Xirinachs reaffirmed ECLAC’s longstanding commitment to supporting sustainable development efforts in the BVI and all Caribbean Small Island Developing States (SIDS). He pushed back against the narrative that middle-income classification – a category that includes most Caribbean nations – eliminates the need for continued international support. For SIDS, which face outsized vulnerability to climate disasters and global economic volatility, sustained international assistance remains non-negotiable for advancing the SDGs, he noted.

Salazar-Xirinachs also recognized the BVI’s active leadership role during the recent Forum meeting. In his capacity as Vice Chair of the Caribbean Development and Cooperation Committee, Wheatley led a dedicated Caribbean-focused panel exploring the implementation of the Antigua and Barbuda Agenda for SIDS through expanded South-South cooperation.

Closing the discussion, Wheatley reaffirmed the BVI’s unwavering commitment to both regional collaboration and the global sustainable development agenda. “Through our various leadership roles within UN ECLAC, the British Virgin Islands will continue to advocate for the Caribbean to ensure the subregion’s priorities, including climate resilience, are taken into account in the inter-governmental deliberations of the wider region on the 2030 Agenda, and that there is closer collaboration between the Caribbean and Latin America on the implementation of the SDGs in the remaining period,” he stated.

The 9th Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on Sustainable Development was hosted in the Chilean capital from April 13 to 16, 2026, bringing together hundreds of government officials, UN representatives, and civil society stakeholders to align on sustainable development action.