JEDDAH, 16 February — French tax authorities have threatened to confiscate the property of Harb ibn Saleh Al-Al-Zuhair, a prominent Saudi businessman, if he fails to pay tax worth 80 million francs.
They also raided his house in southwestern France, made a list of its contents and took way his car.
Al- Zuhair, who is in France, blasted the French Tax Department’s action as a violation of Saudi-French agreements and human rights.
“These provocative actions will surely damage business ties between the two countries,” he remarked.
Inspectors from the department raided the house, located in Biarritz, last week while Al-Zuhair was present. “They came in four vehicles and a large truck and a police car,” Al-Zuhair told Arab News.
Al-Zuhair is planning to take legal action against the French authorities and has appointed Saudi lawyer, Dr. Saleh Al-Tayyar, to follow up the case in coordination with a French lawyer.
Al-Zuhair, a resident of Riyadh, said the French authorities had been tracking him for the past two years for allegedly dodging tax payments worth millions of francs. The tax department claimed that Al-Zuhair owed the state 80 million francs in tax for the years from 1996 to 1998.
Early last year, they filed a suit alleging Al-Zuhair was a permanent resident of France, owned a house in the country since 1987 and has been running his business operations in Saudi Arabia from France.
They also argued that he had bank accounts in France, and under French law, he, as all permanent residents in the country, should pay tax.
Al-Zuhair has produced official documents which he says prove he was a permanent resident of Saudi Arabia and that his stay in France was for health reasons and not business.
Al-Zuhair had met with the French state minister for foreign trade and raised the issue of the tax department’s crackdown on him.
“I have also taken up this matter to Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Fahd and the official Saudi authorities, who have expressed deep concern over the issue as it violates the agreements signed by France and Saudi Arabia,” Al-Zuhair later wrote in a letter to the French minister.
He called for a review of the bilateral double taxation agreement to remove all the loopholes that might be exploited by the French tax authorities.
“I am saying all this because every Saudi who owns property or businesses in France could be subjected to similar harassment by the French tax authorities,” he said.
Muhammad Ziad Al-Zuhair, the businessman’s office director, said that the French department’s move to unjustly seize Al-Zuhair’s property in Biarritz and his shares in Banque SBA would set “a bad precedent”.
