Rafik Mashadyan refutes existence of early agreements between tax  authority and business to underpay taxes

ArmInfo. There were no agreements between the State Revenue Committee of Armenia and supermarkets to pay fewer taxes. Rafik Mashadyan, first deputy chairman of the State Revenue Committee (SRC), stated this in an interview with journalists  on June 28.

According to him, he was invited to the National Security Service and  interrogated. The representative of the SRC refrained from assessing  the extent to which his answers were satisfied by the investigative  body.  But, if necessary, he is ready to visit the department once  more. Referring to the secret of the investigation, Mashadyan is not  ready to talk at what stage the investigation is being conducted and  what the investigative bodies came to, and whether the former  chairman of the SRC, Vardan Harutyunyan, former Prime Minister Karen  Karapetyan and ex-President Serzh Sargsyan are on trial.

Nevertheless, Rafik Mashadyan, then head of the tax inspection  department of large taxpayers of Armenia, insists that the RA State  Revenue Committee did not give any business entity a privilege.  "There were no agreements between SRC and organizations that gave the  informal right to underpay taxes to the latter," he said.  Nevertheless, as Mashadyan pointed out, the SRC simply "did not  administer from those economic entities that operated on one site  through two or more organizations."

To recall, on May 30, the National Security Council of Armenia  announced the disclosure of a scheme by which large retail chains  evaded taxes for years. By creating numerous IPs, Alex Holding LLC  instead of VAT at a rate of 20% and the profit tax paid only the  turnover tax (2%), processing the goods on fake IPs.  "Taking  advantage of the opportunity given by the ex-leadership of the SRC,  arbitrary and illegal," Alex Holding ", in addition to local  agricultural products, through these PIs sold other products, as well  as imported agricultural products, paying only turnover tax," the NSS  informed. It was stressed that according to reliable data , the  previous leadership of SRC was given a similar opportunity to 11  other large companies engaged in network trading, which created  obviously unfavorable and unequal competition e conditions for other  enterprises involved in agricultural trade and paying VAT.

On June 4, the head of the National Security Council Arthur Vanetsyan  in the parliament, referring to the sensational violations in the  activity of Armenian supermarkets, said that within the framework of  this case the Deputy Head of the State Revenue Committee Rafik  Mashadyan will be questioned. "Mashadyan will be questioned, as he  was present at the negotiations, during which the SRC gave such  privileges to the supermarket owners," Vanetsian said.