Tax fraud penalties to increase 5-fold

• 19.03.2015, 12:49

The Tax Ministry wants penalties for tax evasion to be raised.

The Belarusian Tax Ministry proposes to increase tax fraud penalties for economic agents..

The statement was made by deputy tax minister Vasili Kamenka, BelaPAN reports.

He thinks penalties for tax evasion are too low in Belarus. “The penalty is only 20% of the unpaid amount of taxes. We think penalties must be raised to at least 100% of the unpaid amount. Maybe it shouldn't be 300%, but they should at least be equal to the unpaid taxes,” Vasili Kamenka said.

He stressed that small penalties do not prevent economic agents from carrying out fake business activities with the aim of evading taxes. “A very large number of economic agents continue to deal with dummy companies and does it deliberately,” the deputy minister noted.

“We need stricter sanctions to minimise the economic effect for offenders,” Kamenka said.

According to him, the initiative of the ministry was submitted to government. “If we receive appropriate instructions, we will start working on draft legal acts,” the deputy tax minister explained.