Implementation of Constitutional and Legal Protection of the Rights and Lawful Interests of Citizens in the Republic of Belarus

15.10.2025

Ensuring the supremacy of the Constitution and the effective protection of citizens’ constitutional rights are key elements of any state’s legal system. One of the mechanisms for protecting the rights and lawful interests of citizens in the Republic of Belarus is the review by the Constitutional Court of the constitutionality of normative legal acts in the state through constitutional proceedings.

These proceedings make it possible, on the basis of a citizen’s constitutional complaint submitted in the prescribed manner, to assess the constitutionality of a law applied in a specific case which, in the citizen’s view, has violated their constitutional rights and freedoms.

The conclusions and decisions of the Constitutional Court have direct effect and do not require confirmation by other state bodies, other organisations or officials. A normative legal act that is recognised, pursuant to a conclusion or decision of the Constitutional Court, as not conforming to the Constitution (unconstitutional) has no legal force. Such recognition is grounds for terminating the effect of that normative legal act, amending it, or adopting (issuing) a new normative legal act with the same subject matter of legal regulation.

By way of example, we refer to the Decision of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Belarus of 27.03.2025, by which the interrelated provisions of parts nine to twelve of paragraph 19 of Article 208 and Article 73-1 of the Tax Code were recognised as not conforming to the Constitution of the Republic of Belarus.

These provisions imposed, from 01.01.2022, an obligation on a natural person to pay personal income tax on income derived from the sale of crop products exceeding, in a calendar year, 200 base values (currently BYN 8,400), where such income was indicated by the person in explanations of sources of income within the framework of a tax audit of the conformity of their expenditure to their income.

Previously, prior to 01.01.2022, such income — subject to certain conditions (receipt by the person themselves and/or their close relatives or in-laws, cultivation of products on an allocated land plot, availability of a confirming certificate from the local executive and administrative body)—was exempt from personal income tax for natural persons regardless of the amount of income.

In other words, the calculation of the tax and the obligation to pay it were introduced retroactively.

By the Decision of the Constitutional Court of 27.03.2025, adopted following consideration of a citizen’s constitutional complaint, this approach was found not to conform to the Constitution of the Republic of Belarus. The Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus was required, no later than 27.06.2025, to submit to the House of Representatives of the National Assembly of the Republic of Belarus a draft law introducing the relevant amendments to the Tax Code, and law-enforcement/applying authorities, pending such amendments, were to ensure compliance with the principles of the rule of law and justice.

As a result, the relevant bill to amend the Tax Code was submitted to the House of Representatives of the National Assembly and, on 03.10.2025, was adopted at first reading.

Under the provisions of the bill adopted at first reading, income from the sale of crop products (as well as income from the sale of livestock products, in respect of which a similar legal regulation had been established from 01.01.2022) will be determined under the generally established procedure.

It should be noted that the Tax Code also contains—and other provisions are currently applied—which allow personal income tax to be additionally assessed on natural persons de facto retroactively.

In particular, this became possible on the basis of the second part of paragraph 12 of Article 73-1 of the Tax Code introduced from 01.01.2024, concerning the procedure for confirming the conformity of a natural person’s expenditure to their income.

Under this provision, if a natural person:

• initially did not in fact receive a demand from the tax authority to provide explanations on sources of income together with the calculation; and
• subsequently received these documents upon their repeated sending by the tax authority on the basis of the person’s own application,
• then funds transferred for safekeeping and/or received as loans are not taken into account as the person’s income, notwithstanding that they are indicated in the person’s explanations on sources of income.

The exceptions are funds received in non-cash form or under transactions documented by a state body and/or another organisation, an individual entrepreneur, or a notary.

Accordingly, a person who genuinely did not receive the initial demand of the tax authority and received it upon repeated sending finds themselves in a situation where previously received funds in the form of loans—including those received prior to 01.01.2024—are excluded from the income potentially substantiating the expenditure incurred. As a consequence, this may lead to additional tax assessments.

We consider that, should the Constitutional Court consider citizens’ complaints concerning the unconstitutionality of this provision of the Tax Code, the Court may adopt a decision taking an approach analogous to that set out above regarding the procedure for establishing the obligation to pay personal income tax by natural persons.

Authors: Mikhail Dzenisiuk.