Spanish:
 
|
Venezuela freezes oil group Eni's accounts over unpaid taxes
AFP
CARACAS
Petroleumworld.com 03 25 06A Venezuelan court on Friday froze the accounts of Italian oil giant Eni's local operations at the demand of the tax authority, which cited unpaid taxes for the period 2001-2004.
The accounts provisionally were blocked to recover 46.2 million dollars owed in back taxes because the foreign company "has not honored its commitments to pay,", the tax authority Seniat said.
Eni executives and tax officials have held several meetings in the past seven months during an audit of the company, whose local administrative offices were recently closed.
Since mid-2005, the government of leftist President Hugo Chavez has strictly applied a 2001 law that increases the tax rate for oil companies to 50 percent from 36 percent.
The Seniat is seeking back taxes owed by 22 oil companies, most of them foreign, who signed a contract in the 1990s with state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela for the exploration of the country's energy resources.
It estimates the companies owe the government a combined two billion dollars.
- 03/24/2006 17:25 - AFPCopyright © 1994-2006 Agence France-Presse. All Rights Reserved.
Your
feedback is important to us!
We invite all our readers to share with us
their views and comments about this article.
Write to editor@petroleumworld.com
Any
question or suggestions, please write to:
editor@petroleumworld.com
Best
Viewed with IE
5.01+
Windows
NT 4.0, '95, '98 and ME +/ 800x600 pixels