ArmInfo. During a government meeting on March 19 discussing draft amendments to the Tax Code, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan lamented that he had long been receiving "signals" from businesses accusing the government of "tax terror". Meanwhile, the Prime Minister noted that the government not only has any desire to pressure businesses, but, on the contrary, is investing tens of billions in supporting them and stimulating the economy.
"Today, almost every company has purchased equipment or machinery or taken out a preferential loan with our assistance. At the same time, our principle remains simple and clear: we expect businesses to maintain tax discipline and make timely tax payments. Not a penny more, not a penny less," he added. "However, since complaints were constantly coming in, the issue was discussed at various venues, during working meetings and conferences. We tried to understand in practice the basis for this impression, and we realized that our legislation contains provisions under which the State Revenue Committee acts automatically in many cases. That is, if the legal threshold is exceeded, the system is required to engage, otherwise officials could be accused of dereliction of duty. The Chairman of the Investigative Committee also participated in these discussions, and we generally reached a consensus and are now implementing it.
"Therefore, I declare the tax terror closed," he declared. Then, he laughed at his own words and continued: "The important thing is that I don't declare it open-the important thing is that I declare it closed."
