Strike leader Anatol Shumchanka (left) and Deputy Prime Minister Anatol Kabyakou speaking in Minsk on 1 March
On 1 March, small retail traders went on an open-ended strike, protesting a new taxation rule requiring that they pay an 18 percent value-added tax (VAT) on goods imported from Russia. Beginning 1 January, Belarus switched to the country-of-destination principle in VAT collection in trade with Russia. The protesters, operators of stalls and kiosks at outdoor markets throughout Belarus, want the government to abolish VAT for individual entrepreneurs who pay the so-called single tax (a fixed sum of some $150 per month). According to organizers of the strike, some 80,000 vendors have refused to pay VAT on Russian imports.
