{"id":9865,"date":"2016-12-16T05:34:10","date_gmt":"2016-12-16T09:34:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/?p=9865"},"modified":"2016-12-16T05:34:10","modified_gmt":"2016-12-16T09:34:10","slug":"pass-the-facta-or-face-the-us-fatwa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/?p=9865","title":{"rendered":"Pass the FACTA or Face the US FATWA"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Stephen Kangal
\nDecember 16, 2016<\/em><\/p>\n

Stephen Kangal<\/a>This simple headline encapsulates in its entirety all the infringements of international law, diplomacy, human rights and acceptable standards of inter-state relations that are impregnated in the modus operandi of the internationalization of the 2010 FACTA Law passed by the US Congress. <\/p>\n

It was a tax-collection domestic legislation of the USA. It is now being imposed against several tenets of international relations with the sword of Damocles hanging over the heads of unsuspecting T&T via US Treasury\/IRS- issued deadlines and threats with the Minister of Finance, Hon. Colm Imbert on bended knees dodging bullets from US aggression.
\n
\nAll of these infringements would invalidate the bilateral Inter-Governmental Agreement (IGA) concluded with T&T and render it patently null and void when one considers the 1969 UN Law on Treaties.<\/p>\n

It is clear that FACTA is a unilateral application of the tentacles of the Act beyond US territorial jurisdiction (extra-territoriality principle). It infringes and undermines the sovereignty of T&T as well as the supremely independent law-creating capacity of the T&T Parliament. The IGA signed by T&T is a pre-FACTA diversionary fa\u00e7ade whilst it was a post-FACTA operationalization and internationalization of the FACTA initiative being imposed by the US Government on a vulnerable developing state such as T&T.<\/p>\n

FACTA was engineered in the USA that will have the effect of interfering in the internal domestic affairs of T&T and other states by means of coercive duress (deadlines and signing of the IGA under duress) and potential black-mail and threat of bringing T&T’s economy to a disastrous screeching halt for failure to adhere to the latest issued September 2017 deadline to become FACTA-compliant. This grand conspiracy against T&T includes the Global Forum countries that T&T has to deal with having been declared non-tax compliant with two other countries by that said Forum.<\/p>\n

FACTA is a form of potential economic aggression or FATWA against T&T- a sovereign state member of the UN that recognizes the sovereign equality of all States irrespective of size as well as the principle of non-interference in their internal especially parliamentary affairs as set out in the Charter of the UN.<\/p>\n

The Government of T&T is no longer the sole and exclusive authority for foreign policy creation and determination legitimised on the basis of the exercise of its territorial integrity and political independence. <\/p>\n

The USA and the Global Forum have arrogated unto themselves the ability to exercise this competence.<\/p>\n

FACTA is not only ostensibly a unilateral tax- collection and anti- avoidance regime exercisable way beyond the boundaries of the USA albeit on the principle of reciprocity with T&T. But it will serve also as a powerful and effective antidote to stem the tide of future inflows of US investment personal and corporate capital into T&T upon which the latter depends upon for its survival and economic development. <\/p>\n

It is a coercive means of getting foreign countries to aid in US tax collection drive as well as to undermine their respect for human rights and to disclose on a regular basis without requests, to the US Treasury and the IRS hitherto confidential information of US tax-payers related to accounts held in the banks\/insurance companies and other financial institutions of T&T. To do this T&T has to undertake enormous expenditure for the establishment of a special unit within the Board of Inland Revenue Department to fulfill\/execute this function expeditiously and efficiently.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Stephen Kangal December 16, 2016 This simple headline encapsulates in its entirety all the infringements of international law, diplomacy, human rights and acceptable standards of inter-state relations that are impregnated in the modus operandi of the internationalization of the 2010 FACTA Law passed by the US Congress. It was a tax-collection domestic legislation of … Continue reading Pass the FACTA or Face the US FATWA<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,1,186,39],"tags":[1240,1015,173,49],"class_list":["post-9865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-finance","category-general-tt","category-law","category-usa","tag-facta","tag-politics","tag-stephen-kangal","tag-tt-govt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9865"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9865\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9866,"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9865\/revisions\/9866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.trinidadandtobagonews.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}