• Military

• WMD Menu                           

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Operations
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• Intelligence
• Homeland Security
• Space

Tax deal with China involves no sovereignty issue: premier

ROC Central News Agency

2009/12/22 20:33:58

Taipei, Dec. 22 (CNA) Premier Wu Den-yih on Tuesday dismissed speculations that the reason for the delay in signing a deal with China on avoidance of double taxation was due to issues involving the island's sovereignty.

Negotiators of Taiwan and China concluded the latest round of talks the central Taiwan city of Taichung earlier in the day, without signing the tax agreement, which was among four items on the agenda for discussion.

Taiwan and China had earlier reached consensus on a taxation system based on where the taxpayer resides, Wu said.

However, Chinese negotiators later brought up the idea of basing the system on the origin of the income and cited a similar pact between Hong Kong and China as an example, he added.

"We are not in the same status as Hong Kong," Wu said.

Commenting on reports that China-based Taiwanese investors worried that they would have to pay higher taxes under the proposed agreement, Wu said that there will be no problems if everyone obeys the law.

Following the talks, Taiwan's top negotiator Chiang Pin-kung told a press conference that putting on hold the tax agreement will not have a negative impact on Chinese investment in the island.

Asked if the agreement would be signed at the next round of talks, a Taiwanese official who took part in the talks did not give a specific answer.

"We, of course, hope that it would happen as early as possible, " said Liu Te-shun, the vice chairman of Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council (MAC).

Top negotiators from both sides said that the taxation issue remains on the agenda of future negotiations.

"Both sides had reached a consensus on the main content of the agreement on avoiding double taxation, " said Chiang.

"On the technical front, however, both sides believe that more time is needed," he explained.

The agreement had been previously slated to take effect on Jan. 1, 2010. Now, it could enter into force by 2011 at the earliest, according to Liu.

Chiang, the chairman of Taiwan's Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF), ended up with inking three agreements with his Chinese counterpart Chen Yunlin on fishing crew cooperation, agricultural quarantine inspection, and industrial product standards, inspection and certification at the end of the talks held in central Taiwan.

The SEF is a quasi-official body set up to handle cross-strait exchanges with its counterpart, the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS), in the absence of formal ties between the two sides.

The next round of Taiwan-China talks, the fifth round since talks resumed last year, is slated to take place in China during the first half of 2010.

(By Hsieh Chia-chen, Chou Hui-ying, Lin Shu-yuan and Alex Jiang) enditem/cs