ARMENIAN PARLIAMENT GIVES PRELIMINARY APPROVAL TO TAX-RELATED BILL

ARKA
September 16, 2009
Yerevan

YEREVAN, September 16. /ARKA/. On Tuesday, Armenian National Assembly
approved amendments to the administrative offences code and the laws on
excise tax, on VAT, on taxes and on profit tax at the first refading.

The lawmakers were set to vote on the bill yet before the summer
recess, but the vote was postponed twice – on June 9 and 10 on the
initiative of MPs and the cabinet ministers.

The amendments propose taxation mitigation for small and large
entrepreneurs.

The amendments are based on the principle of separation of small,
mid-scale and large businesses.

Some of them, such as introduction of permanent tax representative,
apply only to large companies, who have over 500 employees and whose
annual turnover exceeds AMD 4 billion.

After summer debates in the Parliament over the bill was reconsidered
and put on the National Assembly’s floor again.

On Tuesday, Deputy Finance Minister Suren Ghazaryan, presenting
the reconsidered bill to legislators, said all their proposals were
upheld by the cabinet, and the status of permanent tax representatives
was changed.

Now tax agencies’ representatives will be empowered to control only
excisable goods and their quantity.

Karayan also said that the list of the companies, where tax
representatives would be, have been specified as well.