ARTICLE 1

The text of Article 10 (Dividends) of the Convention is suspended and replaced by the following:

1. Dividends paid by a company which is a resident of a Contracting State to a resident of the other Contracting State may be taxed in that other State.

2. However, such dividends may also be taxed in the Contracting State of which the company paying the dividends is a resident, and according to the laws of that State, but if the beneficial owner of the dividends is a resident of the other Contracting State, the tax so charged shall not exceed:

(a) 5 percent of the gross amount of the dividends if the beneficial owner is a company which owns directly at least 10 percent of the voting stock of the company paying the dividends;

(b) 15 percent of the gross amount of the dividends in all other cases. This paragraph shall not affect the taxation of the company in respect of the profits out of which the dividends are paid.

3. The term "dividends" as used in this Article means income from shares, "jouissance" shares or "jouissance" rights, mining shares, founders' shares or other rights, not being debt-claims, participating in profits, as well as income from other corporate rights which is subjected to the same taxation treatment as income from shares by the laws of the State of which the company making the distribution is a resident. This term also includes income - even if paid in the form of interest - which is taxable as income from capital invested by the members of a company, other than a company with share capital, which is a resident of Belgium.

4. The provisions (1) and (2) shall not apply if the beneficial owner of the dividends, being a resident of a Contracting State, carries on business in the other Contracting State of which the company paying the dividends is a resident, through a permanent establishment situated therein, or performs in that other State independent personal services from a fixed base situated therein, and the holding in respect of which the dividends are paid forms part of the assets of such permanent establishment or fixed base. In such case, the provisions of Article 7 (Business Profits) or Article 14 (Independent Personal Services), as the case may be, shall apply.

5. Where a company which is a resident of a Contracting State pays dividends, the other Contracting State may not impose any tax on the dividends paid by that company to a resident of the first-mentioned State, except insofar as the holding in respect of which the dividends are paid forms part of the assets of a permanent establishment or a fixed base situated in that other State.

6. For the purpose of paragraph (4) and notwithstanding any other provision of the Convention, dividends paid by a company which is a resident of Belgium in respect of a holding which forms part of the assets of a permanent establishment situated in Belgium, may be taxed separately in accordance with Belgian law.