Prime Minister of Kuwait to visit Guyana

Feb 25, 2010 News

– Could sign double taxation agreement

The Prime Minister of Kuwait, the world’s fourth-largest oil exporter, plans to visit Guyana this April, as Guyana and Kuwait look to increase trade and investment.
The Prime Minister, Nasir al-Muhammad al-Ahmad al-Sabah, is planning the Guyana visit as part of a tour to Latin America and the Caribbean, a top Kuwaiti foreign affairs official told Kaieteur News yesterday.

Nasir al-Muhammad al-Ahmad al-Sabah, Prime Minister of Kuwait

One of the outcomes of the Prime Minister’s visit could be the signing of the Guyana/Kuwait Double Taxation Agreement, said Abdulaziz al-Sallal, the leader of a Kuwaiti delegation in Guyana to finalise that agreement.
Negotiations of the agreement began in 2005, John Isaacs, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said, and he welcomed the Kuwaiti commitment to have the contentious issues of the agreement settled in this round of negotiations.
The agreement is to avoid tax being levied twice on the remuneration or any other money earned by a Guyanese or Kuwaiti.
A major goal of bilateral tax treaties is to remove impediments to international trade and investment by abating the risk of double taxation that can occur when both contracting states impose tax on the same income.
A bilateral tax treaty generally increases the extent to which exporters residing in one contracting state can engage in trading activity in the other contracting state without attracting tax liability in that latter.
Abdulaziz al-Sallal said the Guyana/Kuwait Double Taxation Agreement would provide a “proper environment” for investors. He said such an agreement would build on agreements signed between Guyana and Kuwait when President Bharrat Jagdeo visited last month.
Kuwaiti Minister of Finance Mustafa Al-Shimali and Guyana’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett, who accompanied President Jagdeo on his Middle East tour, had signed an agreement on encouraging bilateral investments. There were also agreements signed on political consultations and cultural relations. Rodrigues-Birkett had said all of this is being done as Guyana looks to create appropriate regimes for investment.
As Guyana looks to start drilling for oil this year, she said it was important to learn from the experiences of countries which have done well in managing their oil wealth, such as Kuwait.
During President Jagdeo’s visit, Kuwait agreed to give Guyana US$10 million for infrastructure projects. That will most likely go towards developing new housing areas on the East Bank, where the government recently acquired 2,000 acres of land from the Guyana Sugar Corporation to develop 10,000 new house lots.
Guyana and Kuwait established diplomatic relations in 1975, and Guyana currently has US$50 million in debt to Kuwait.