07/04/2017 – 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. This meeting, coming after the second plenary 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 provide their views and input to the Inclusive Framework on BEPS.

Participants discussed 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 designed to help low-income countries was extensively considered together with capacity-building initiatives currently in place or under development to address countries' needs. The meeting also offered an opportunity to participants to be 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.

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). 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.

UPDATE (11 April): Further information about the meeting is available in the Co-chairs' statement.

Media queries should be directed to Pascal Saint-Amans, Director of the OECD Centre for Tax Policy and Administration (CTPA) or the CTPA Communications Team.