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Rolf Saastad Following the Manninen and Fokus Bank cases from 2004, the Norwegian Ministry of Finance confirmed in 2006 that the dividend taxation regime was not in accordance with the EEA agreement. This applied both to Norwegian withholding tax levied on dividends paid to non-Norwegian EEA resident shareholders and to Norwegian income tax on dividends received from companies resident in EEA. The ministry accordingly allowed taxpayers to reclaim taxes for the periods commencing from January 1 2003.

Sead Dado Salkovic Advertising and promotion are the main forms of the publicity activities of companies. Keeping this in mind, all tax aspects of these expenditures have to be taken into consideration as well as the reflection they make on the tax balances of the company.

Suzanne Boers For decades, the Netherlands has been pursuing an active treaty policy. In concluding new tax treaties, the Netherlands aims to maintain and strengthen its position as attractive place of investment for international business and to combat tax fraud. Recently, the Dutch Ministry of Finance published a new memorandum regarding the Dutch policy on tax treaties.

David Cuéllar Francisco Zamora As part of the commitment that Mexico has with the OECD to standardise its exchange of information rules, several exchange of information agreements have been signed by Mexico with countries that were in the past considered preferred tax regimes, or tax havens, for Mexican tax purposes. A punitive withholding tax rate is applicable for payments carried out to entities resident in such jurisdictions; the applicable punitive withholding tax rate for 2011 is 40%.

Gary Gowrea The latest addition to the Mauritius DTAA network is the Republic of Congo. The DTAA was signed on December 20 2010 and it will be in force once it is ratified by both states. The DTAA offers considerable tax planning opportunities for structuring investments and royalties in Congo. The main articles of the DTAA have been summarised in tables 1, 2 and 3.

Elena Kostovska The FYR Macedonian VAT Law provides for the possibility of VAT refund for non-residents given that some conditions are met.

Gerry Thornton Alan Keating Ireland has extended the asset classes which Irish structured finance companies (frequently referred to as section 110 companies) may hold to include commodities, plant and machinery and carbon offsets.

Sabrina Wong Josh Jones Foreign entities considering how to access excess funds in their Canadian subsidiaries without triggering adverse Canadian tax consequences may want to utilise the financing strategies used in three recent Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) rulings.

Simeon Grigorov Under the provisions of the Bulgarian Individual Income Tax Law, capital gains realised as a result of the disposal of financial instruments carried out on regulated stock markets in Bulgaria or in an EU member state or a state that is party to the EEA are excluded from the taxable income. Capital gains on financial assets, which are unrealised are taxable only in the case of financial institutions.

Sead Dado Salkovic Slobodan Mihajlovic The tax treaty on avoidance of double taxation of income and capital signed on February 5 2008 between Spain and Bosnia and Herzegovina came effective on January 4 2011. The treaty applies to residents of one or both contracting states and covers the taxation of personal income, corporate profit, non-resident income, property tax, local taxes on income and property in Spain and profit, personal income tax and property tax in B&H.