Indonesia names Toba Pulp Lestari as suspect in alleged tax fraud case

JAKARTA — Indonesia's Attorney General's Office (AGO) on Monday (Sept 7) named listed pulp producer Toba Pulp Lestari as a suspect in a case involving alleged tax fraud which resulted in a state loss of around two trillion rupiah (S$143 million).

The AGO last month named two tax officers as suspects for allegedly accepting bribes from Toba Pulp Lestari. Both, identified by prosecutors only by their initials, were tax audit supervisors for Toba Pulp Lestari between 2020 and 2024.

Toba Pulp Lestari did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Saiful ​Bahri Siregar, director of investigations at AGO's special ​crimes unit, told reporters that prosecutors alleged under-invoicing by Toba Pulp Lestari between 2008 and 2025.

Toba Pulp Lestari is alleged to have violated an anti-corruption clause in Indonesia's criminal code, he said.

Prosecutors allege Toba Pulp Lestari changed and manipulated a system code where a product should have been classified as dissolving pulp but was reported as another lower-value product, Siregar said.

Prosecutors also allege Toba Pulp Lestari submitted tax reports that were not in accordance with the actual transactions, he added.

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