Our Team

The people who handle these matters

The part of a citizenship file that decides it is rarely the part applicants worry about. Nobody is refused for filling in a form badly. Files fail on the account of where the money came from, on a residence history that produces certificates from four authorities at four speeds, and on something adverse that surfaces during the check rather than in the application.

The lawyers below work on those three things.

Iryna Berenstein

Corporate & Investment Law
Fifteen years in investment regulation, wealth management and compliance, advising high-net-worth clients across the Israeli, UAE, British and United States markets. On citizenship files her work concentrates on the element applicants most often underestimate — presenting the origin of funds in a form that survives examination.

Tarek Muhammad

Senior Legal Advisor
Fifteen years in criminal and international law, sanctions and compliance, handling complex multi-jurisdictional matters. On citizenship files he takes the situations others decline: adverse history, earlier refusals, and applicants whose background needs explaining before it is discovered.

Christina Abdel Ahad

International Business & Human Rights
Dual-qualified, with an LLM in International Business Law. Advises on cross-border transactions, arbitration and wealth management, and works with clients in Arabic, English and French — which matters more than it sounds when documents arrive in three languages and have to agree with one another.

Marcin Ajs

International & White-Collar Criminal Law
Partner at Dziekański Chowaniec Ajs and a member of the European Criminal Bar Association since 2014. Specialises in international criminal law and, on these matters, advises where a due diligence check is likely to raise questions that are better answered in advance.

How the first conversation goes

It is an assessment, not a pitch, and it is held with the person who would do the work. We want to know your nationality, every country you have lived in for six months or more in the past ten years, whether anyone is applying alongside you, and what documents exist for how your funds accumulated. Those four answers usually settle whether the file is viable.

We do not promise approval. The Vanuatu Citizenship Commission decides at its discretion and no one outside it can commit to an outcome or a date. What can be established in advance is whether a file looks capable of surviving due diligence, and what it needs before it is lodged — which is worth knowing before a non-refundable fee is paid.

Getting in touch

Send an outline through the contact page. Keep it short; anything adverse in your history is better raised there, at the start, than discovered by a compliance officer later.