Almost 50 delegates from 14 countries and 7 organisations gathered in Tbilisi for the second regional meeting of the Inclusive Framework on Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) in the Eastern Europe and Central Asia region on 5-7 April. The event was hosted by the Ministry of Finance and the Revenue Service of Georgia, and organised by the OECD in partnership with the Intra-European Organisation of Tax Administrations (IOTA).
This meeting, coming after the second meeting of the Inclusive Framework held in Paris on 26-27 January 2017, belongs to a new series of regional events that offer participants from different regions in the world the opportunity to express their views and provide their input to the Inclusive Framework on BEPS.
IOTA has joined the Inclusive Framework in 2016 and reinforced its strategic partnership with OECD, under the Memorandum of Understanding on Co-operation, commiting to support and work together on the development, implementation and monitoring of the BEPS Project through the Regional Meetings of the BEPS Inclusive Framework. Starting from 2015, IOTA has been actively involved in organising such events to support developing countries in the Eastern Europe and Central Asia region on the implementation of the BEPS package.
The meeting offered an opportunity for participants to discuss the status of implementation of the BEPS measures, with a specific focus on the peer-review mechanisms as well as timelines for the implementation of the minimum standards. The work on toolkits was extensively considered together with capacity-building initiatives currently in place or under development to address countries' needs. Delegates were updated on recent developments in transfer pricing and the tax treaties area, including country-by-country reporting and the tax treaty-related minimum standards. There was a specific focus on the Multilateral Instrument as a means of swiftly implementing the tax treaty-related measures.
These discussions provided the ideal forum to obtain input for the work on implementing BEPS measures; the challenges currently being faced in the implementation phase; and the priorities of the participating countries and their needs in relation to capacity building and training.
Participants included senior officials from ministries of finance and tax administrations from Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Georgia, Kuwait, Latvia, Lithuania, Oman, Pakistan, Poland, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Turkey and Ukraine, as well as representatives from BIAC (Ernst and Young), Dechert, Deloitte, GIZ, Grant Thornton LLC, KPMG and Nexia TA.
Opened by the First Deputy Minister of Finance of Georgia, Director General (DG) of Revenue Service of Georgia, Mr Giorgi Tabuashvili, the meeting was co-chaired by David Chitaishvili, Advisor, Revenue Service of Georgia and Eugenijus Soldatkovas, Technical Taxation Expert, IOTA.
Further information about the meeting is available in the Co-chairs' statement.
Further information about BEPS is available on the OECD webpage.