DUSHANBE, December 19, 2013, Asia-Plus -- The Tax Committee under the Government of Tajikistan and Open Joint-Stock Company (OJSC) Sangtudinskaya GES-1, which operates the Sangtuda-1 hydroelectric power plant (HPP), have signed a tax debt repayment agreement.

The document was signed here on December 19 by Pavel Lavrov, Director-General of OJSC Sangtudinskaya GES-1 and Nusratullo Davlatov, Chairman of the Tax Committee of Tajikistan.

According a joint press release issued by OJSC Sangtudinskaya GES-1 and Tajikistan’s Tax Committee, repayment of the tax debts will be carried out in accordance with the schedule coordinated by both sides.

Under this agreement, the Tax Committee has suspended measures of forced recovery of tax debts from Sangtudinskaya GES-1.

As of December 1, 2013, the OJSC Sangtudinskaya GES-1 tax debts reportedly amounted to 52 million somoni.  Meanwhile, Barqi Tojik (the state-owned utility responsible for generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity in Tajikistan) now owes more than 404 million somoni to OJSC Sangtudinskaya GES-1.

The Tajik and Russian presidents officially unveiled the fourth and last unit of the Sangtuda-1 HPP (650 MW) on July 31, 2009.

The construction of the Sangtuda-1 hydropower plant located some 110 kilometers southeast of Dushanbe began in the late 1980s.  By the early 1990s, only 20% of the construction work had been completed, and further construction was suspended due to a civil war that broke out in Tajikistan in the early 1990s.  The talks between Russia and Tajikistan on completing the construction of the Sangtuda-1 HPP began in 2003 and in 2004 the parties signed an inter-governmental agreement.

Russian-Tajik OJSC Sangtudinskaya GES-1 was established to complete the construction of the Santuda-1 power plant.  Russia’s Inter RAO YeES and the Ministry of Energy and Industries of Tajikistan signed an agreement on the establishment of the company in Dushanbe on February 16, 2005.

Russia owns 75% percent of the shares minus one share and Tajikistan assumes the 25% ownership interest plus one share in Sangtudinskaya GES-1.