Mokestinių sutarčių vieta tarptautinio apmokestinimo teisinio reguliavimo šaltinių hierarchijoje

Due to the rapidly enhancing globalization process, legal regulation of international economic (as well as taxation) relations is becoming more and more important. Taxation issues in Lithuania and other EU Member States are regulated by three independent groups of the sources of law: national law, international law and European Community sources of law.The article aims to analyze how national, international and European Community legal norms correlate in states that are parties to international tax treaties, and what position double taxation agreements take in the hierarchy of the sources of legal regulation on international taxation.International law does not ignore national law. It merely requires the states to carry out their international obligations conscientiously. However, under their own internal legal systems they are free to choose the technicalities of such implementation. The application of international treaties depends not only on the provisions of a specific tax treaty but also on the state legal system and the doctrine reflected in it: monistic or dualistic. In the majority of states (as a rule, Anglo-Saxon legal systems) the dualistic approach is predominant—international and national law are considered to be separate systems and, thus, the incorporation of international norms into national law is necessary. Meanwhile, the majority of EU Member States (as well as Lithuania) follow the monistic approach by entrenching the supremacy of the sources of international law over national legal systems.EU legal norms are integrated into the Member States’ legal systems and operate directly within their internal legislation. Thus, tax treaties drawn up between EU Member States and third parties, upon the accession of the former to the EU, cannot be in conflict with the provisions of the European Community Treaty (EC Treaty), whereas tax treaties drawn up prior to the accession to the EU are not influenced by the EC Treaty. However, all Member States have to strive to eliminate the existing incompatibilities with the EC Treaty.The Constitutional Act ‘On Membership of the Republic of Lithuania in the European Union’ establishes that EU legal norms are part of the Lithuanian legal system, and in case of a collision with the Lithuanian legal norms the former are supreme. Thus, all national law has to be in conformity with the provisions of the EC Treaty. The provisions of tax treaties (except those drawn up prior to the accession to the EU) also have to be in line with the EC Treaty.Tarptautinė ir Europos Sąjungos (toliau – ES) teisė daro įtaką Lietuvos teisinei sistemai, todėl svarbu nustatyti tarptautinės, Europos Sąjungos ir nacionalinės teisės suderinamumą ir įvertinti šių teisės sistemų santykio praktinę reikšmę sudarant tarptautines mokestines sutartis. Straipsnyje atskleidžiamas tarptautinio apmokestinimo turinys, nurodomi tarptautinio apmokestinimo teisinio reguliavimo šaltiniai, įvertinama mokestinių sutarčių kaip tarptautinės ir nacionalinės teisės šaltinio vieta nacionalinėje teisėje, parodoma ESteisinės sistemos pozicija dėl tarptautinio dvigubo apmokestinimo sutarčių statuso, atskleidžiamas mokestinių sutarčių veikimas Lietuvos teisės sistemoje