Paper by: Martin Hearson
There is growing attention on the question of tax treaties signed by developing countries. The costs of tax treaties to developing countries have been highlighted in recent years by NGOs such as ActionAid and SOMO. During 2014, an influential IMF paper warned that developing countries “would be well-advised to sign treaties only with considerable caution,” and the OECD, as part of its Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) project, proposes to add text to the commentary of its model treaty to help countries decide “whether a treaty should be concluded with a State but also…whether a State should seek to modify or replace an existing treaty or even, as a last resort, terminate a treaty.