Malta has stopped granting citizenship and passports to applicants from Russia and Belarus in exchange for investment, saying it cannot conduct due diligence under the current situation, Reuters reported.

The Mediterranean island began selling passports in 2014 under what is officially called citizenship by investment.

Prime Minister Robert Abela initially resisted calls to end the program for applicants from Russia and its ally Belarus, saying the program had raised hundreds of millions of euros and enabled Malta to provide generous assistance to businesses during the COVID-19 crisis.

But on Wednesday, the agency responsible for processing the requests said the scheme had been put on hold for Russians and Belarusians because recent developments meant that necessary background checks on potential buyers could not be carried out.

The scheme allows wealthy foreigners to obtain citizenship in exchange for an investment of around 1 million euros. Russians make up more than a quarter of all those who have bought citizenship.