Double Tax Agreement between Cyprus and Portugal enters into force

NICOSIA, Cyprus - Nov. 22, 2013 - PRLog -- The double tax treaty (DTT) between Cyprus and Portugal signed on November 19, 2012, entered into force on August 16, 2013, after all ratification procedures were completed by the two countries.

The new DTT will be applicable from 2014 and onwards and mirrors the latest OECD Model agreement providing for a maximum withholding tax rate of 10% on dividends, interest and royalties.

The Protocol to the agreement provides protection against any abuse of the exchange of information provisions. When requesting information from the tax authorities of the one country to the other, following documents should be accompanied:

information proofing the relevance of the requested information;
a statement that the request is in accordance with the law of the contracting state requesting it from;
confirmation that if the requested information was within the jurisdiction of that contracting state then the competent authority would be able to obtain the information under the laws of the requesting contracting state;
a statement that the contracting state making the request has exhausted all available means in its own state to obtain the information.

The entry into force of this DTT formalizes the tax relations between Cyprus and Portugal, which currently has more than 80 countries on its "blacklist", denying its residents certain benefits of the Portuguese tax system. Cyprus was removed from Portugal’s “black list” in 2011.