Official legal source at the ministry declared that what had been published in one of the newspaper that the minister agrees to reconcile in monuments, drugs and weapons cases is untrue, but the tr...

  Official legal source at the ministry declared that what had been published in one of the newspaper that the minister agrees to reconcile in monuments, drugs and weapons cases is untrue, but the truth is that income taxes and customs laws allow  minister of finance or his authorized representative to reconcile in  crimes of taxes and customs evasion  committed by violating its provisions upon request of stakeholders if the reconciliation acceptance achieves state general interest. He said that over twenty years the ministry is used to constitute committee includes wide experiences to consider reconciliation requests presented to the minister according to such two laws and proposes its recommendations, concerning requests refusal or acceptance, on the minister to decide what he sees appropriate . Facilitating  for stakeholders considering such requests, the minister made decision no.405/2013  to authorize his work of considering  reconciliation requests in the evasion crimes , estimated less than L.E 15.000 , to the head of tax authority and customs authority. In order to protect State’s national security and maintain citizens’ health , he added that he excluded this decision of the conciliation in crimes of taxes and customs evasion on prohibited imported goods, drugs, eavesdropping devices, transmitters, and monuments even if estimated lower than EGP15,000 from delegation range, to be the sole right of decision in reconciliation requests in these crimes for the Minister of Finance after offering on the reconciliation committee, according to objective strict rules does not allow reconciliation, except in the range of State's public interest, after the payment of taxes and compensations settled  by the law to accept reconciliation, and concerned persons give up prohibited goods place of customs smuggling. The source pointed out that the conciliation committee within its determined jurisdiction isn't binding with recommendation of accept all conciliation orders presented to the Minister of Finance ,but it has the recommendation of refusal according to the requirements of common good ,specially in the crimes that affect the national security of the country or smuggling prohibited goods. Also he noted that all over the history of the committee, it isn’t recommended to accept reconciliation in smuggling crimes affecting national security or the health of citizens. The source declared that the choice of this committee members is according to their functions and not to their personalities, and just existence of kinship between a member of the Committee and any of the workers in the field of import and export do not lose the authority to perform its role in the committee as long as the offered requests of reconciliation aren't belong to this relative or has no interest in. The Ministry of Finance confirms its fully commitment to cooperate with the media and benefiting from what is broadcast or published by it,  appealing all means of media to investigate the accuracy , objectivity and impartiality in published or broadcast, in order to achieve the public interest in this important phase in the country.    (The source: Ministry of Finance)