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Jerusalem:
19 August, 1998
Invitation to
a Press Conference
The Palestinian Human Rights
Monitoring Group (PHRMG) would like to invite you to its
press conference entitled:
Why is the Role of the Tax
Authorities Absent?
The Security Forces is an Illegal
Authority to Collect Taxes
Extra Judicial Punishments,
Arrests, Torture, and Embezzlement of Public Money
Where Does the Money Levied by the
Security Forces Go?
The conference will take place
tomorrow, 20 August 1998, at 10:15 A.M., at the Ambassador
Hotel in East Jerusalem.
Background:
For almost two years, the General
Intelligence (GI) and the Preventative Security Services
(PSS), have been arresting authorized dealers and accusing
them of tax (VAT) embezzlement: forging invoices, printing
them in special printshops, selling invoices with percentage
profit. These authorized dealers were arrested for long
periods of time ranging from 1 month to 24 months. They were
maltreated and exposed to torture, and they had to confess
by force. They were released after paying large sums of
money in cash for the GI and the PSS. That money was not
being transferred to the Ministry of Finance and Treasury.
Some of these authorized dealers were not even given receipt
vouchers that proved their payments.
It is important to mention that
through the research performed by the PHRMG, it was
discovered that there is a sum of 8 million NIS being
disputed over by the security forces and the Ministry of
Finance.
Two of the men who were victims of tax
embezzlement will participate in the conference. A
comprehensive draft of the report will be distributed.
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