MOSCOW, May 16 (Itar-Tass) - Russian cosmonaut Pavel Vinogradov, the commander of Expedition 36 at the International Space Station, has become the first person on the planet to have paid taxes while in orbit.
Sources indicate that Vinogradov’s rather unusual request was related to the Federal Tax Services by the first woman cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova, who is currently a deputy of the State Duma.
The Federal Tax Service sent a codeword for the ‘member area’ Internet service that enables him to make payments anyplace he finds it possible to get connected to the worldwide web.
While staying aboard the ISS, Vinogradov managed to pay a tax for a plot of land he has in the Moscow region.
Mikhail Mishustin, the director of the Federal Taxation Service, confirmed the fact in a conversation with reporters on the sidelines of a Tax Administration Forum of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, underway in Moscow now.
Pascal Saint-Amans, the director of the OECD Center for Tax Policy and Administration, said in this connection that the long arm of the Russian tax inspectors is already stretched as far out as the near-terrestrial space.
Russia is the only country today that has managed to raise taxes even from a person doing a tour of duty in space, Pascak said joikingly.
He added seriously that the countries dynamically introducing innovations in the field of tax administration are not many.