From: Elina Karakulova (ekarakulova@sorosny.org)
Date: Tue Jul 01 2003 - 13:01:12 EDT
KAZAKH GOVERNMENT TO RAISE TAXES ON OIL-AND-GAS SECTOR
A joint session of the Kazakh parliament on 30 June approved an ambitious action plan submitted by the new government of Prime Minister Daniyal Akhmetov (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 25 June 2003) that foresees a tripling of Kazakhstan's GDP by 2015, khabar.kz reported. Lawmakers had no major complaints about the government's plans, according to khabar.kz, but according to Interfax-Kazakhstan on 30 June, some deputies asked about taxation of the oil-and-gas sector and were told by Akhmetov that the government intends to raise taxes in this sector. A government working group is supposed to draft revisions to the current Tax Code by 1 September, the prime minister was quoted as saying. He agreed with parliamentarians that some existing contracts in the oil-and-gas industry are now inadequate, although earlier they helped attract foreign investment. Akhmetov said that in revising the Tax Code the Kazakh government was copying Norway, where the government controls pricing processes in the oil-and-gas sector. Earlier, Akhmetov stated that contracts with foreign firms will not be rewritten (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 25 June 2003). BB
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