Armenian law toughens punishment for tax dodgers
A set of amendments to the Criminal Code, passed today by the Armenian parliament in the second and final reading, provide for tougher punishment for tax dodgers.
According to deputy justice minister Arthur Hovhannisyan, some provisions of the current law, in particular, article 205, providing for punishment for the evasion of taxes, duties or other mandatory payments, is a cause of discrepancies,
He said under the current legislation, evasion of taxes, duties or other mandatory payments by entering false data in accounting books or other financial documents, committed on a large scale, is punished by a fine in the amount of one hundred up to one thousand minimum wages, with disqualification to hold certain positions or engage in certain types of activities for a term not exceeding five years, or imprisonment for a term of two to three months, or imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years.
Large scale evasion is an amount (value) exceeding the amount of more than one thousand minimum wages set at the time of the crime.
According to the deputy minister, the passed amendments specify the grounds for opening criminal cases for evasion of taxes, duties or other mandatory payments. Arthur Hovhannisyan said some amendments provide for decriminalization of some offenses. For example, false data in the first declaration or use of forged information will be punished by a penalty or imprisonment.
He said one of the amendments raise the amount of large-scale financial offence from 2,000 minimum wages to 4,000. At the same offences up to 4 million drams are decriminalized, being replaced with administrative responsibility. ($ 1 - 486.7 drams). -0-