Conclusive evidence obtained by Bangla Outlook shows that Shaheen Siddique, wife of ousted dictator Sheikh Hasina’s security adviser Major General (Retd) Tarique Ahmed Siddique, secured Cypriot citizenship in December 2020 after investing roughly €2.2 million, or 31 crore taka.

The outlet had reported on the Siddique clan’s possible acquisition of this foreign citizenship last year, well before the July uprising that toppled the Hasina regime.

The new revelation, supported by documents reviewed through multiple investigative sources, exposes a striking contradiction between her declared domestic income and the staggering resources required to secure a European Union passport and a string of high-value properties abroad.

It also marks the latest chapter in a long-running pattern of offshore accumulation surrounding a family long accused of abusing state power, coercing business partners, and laundering funds under the protection of political immunity.

The Cypriot passport did not come easily though, as the investigation found out. Before turning to Cyprus’s now-discontinued “golden passport” programme–widely criticised across the EU for facilitating money laundering–Shaheen made two failed attempts to buy citizenship elsewhere.

Her first was in Antigua and Barbuda in 2013; the second in Malta in 2015–16. Both applications fell through. When she finally succeeded in Cyprus in 2020, the world was deep into the COVID-19 pandemic and global due-diligence systems were strained.

Cyprus was also months away from scrapping its citizenship-for-sale programme under EU pressure. Shaheen’s approval slipped in just before the door shut.

The trail does not end in the Mediterranean. New financial disclosures reveal that Shaheen Siddique purchased three properties in Dubai’s upmarket Arabian Ranches, a neighbourhood favoured by politically exposed persons as well as high-net-worth individuals seeking discreet asset parking.

The first is a 751.18-square-metre plot in Arabian Ranches 1, bought on 14 September 2023 for 8.5 million Dirhams. The other two are flats in Arabian Ranches 3–one 129.03 sq m, the other 145.85 sq m–acquired on 14 and 16 November 2023 for 2.2 million and 2.28 million Dirhams, respectively.

Together, the Dubai properties total roughly 13 million Dirhams, or 43 crore taka.

Between the Cypriot citizenship investment and the Dubai acquisitions, the Siddique family spent the equivalent of at least 74 crore taka within a span of just three years.

But these assets are nowhere to be found in public representations of Shaheen Siddique’s wealth. There is no visible correspondence in the tax filings. No declared business generating such liquidity.

No documented inheritance. No known enterprise capable of producing tens of millions of dollars in clean, movable capital.

For years, Tarique Ahmed Siddique, long-time military adviser to Sheikh Hasina, and brother-in-law to Sheikh Rehana’s husband, has been described in foreign and domestic investigations as one of the most powerful unelected figures in Bangladesh, controlling security and intelligence agencies including the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence (DGFI).

An extensive Al Jazeera investigation in 2019 documented accusations that Tarique used DGFI operatives to abduct, intimidate, and extort business associates.

In one case involving Colonel Shahid Uddin Khan, employees were allegedly kidnapped and interrogated, business documents were seized, and a corporate dispute was turned into a coercive operation backed by the state’s intelligence machinery.

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