The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week released updated Russia-related General License 76A, which replaces General License 76, to clarify that the license applies to Public Joint Stock Company Saint Petersburg Exchange. OFAC said the license previously listed the entity’s name as “Saint Petersburg Stock Exchange.” The license “otherwise remains unchanged,” OFAC said.
Multinational banks are more often choosing not to authorize payments involving sanctioned jurisdictions or people, even if those payments are authorized by a general license or not subject to restrictions, said Richard Newcomb, a DLA Piper lawyer and former director for the Office of Foreign Assets Control. “Even if authorized, banks increasingly will not process a transaction involving or touching a sanctioned country or do business with anyone that has unlawfully done business with a sanctioned person or country,” Newcomb said.
The U.S. this week announced a spate of new Russia-related sanctions and export controls, targeting people and companies supplying Russia’s military, aiding its defense industrial complex or operating in various Russian financial, metals, government and procurement sectors. The measures include additions to the Commerce Department’s Entity List and more than 200 combined sanctions by the Treasury and State departments targeting businesses in China, the United Arab Emirates and elsewhere for sending export-controlled components to Russia.
A recent ruling by a U.K. appellate court “sent the sanctions legal community into a bit of a tailspin” after it appeared to pave the way for the government to treat every Russian public and private entity as a sanctioned party, said Daniel Martin, a sanctions lawyer with HFW. Although the U.K. has since clarified that its sanctions aren’t necessarily meant to apply to every Russian company, Martin said questions remain, including whether banks now will be even less willing to handle Russia-related transactions, whether U.K. lawyers will continue to be able to participate in Russian-related proceedings, and whether similar logic could apply to U.K. sanctions against other countries.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week renewed an authorization for certain Russia-related energy transactions. General License 8H, which replaced GL 8G, authorizes certain transactions with several Russian energy companies through 12:01 a.m. EDT May 1. The license was previously scheduled to expire Nov. 1.
The U.S. was wrong to suspend certain sanctions against Venezuela last week, Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, said, adding that the Biden administration gave in to the Nicolas Maduro-led government’s “empty promises for insignificant electoral reforms.” McCaul, who chairs House Foreign Affairs Committee, said the administration's decision to “imprudently” grant “sweeping sanctions relief” to the country’s oil, gas and gold sectors will “fill the regime’s coffers and allow Maduro to ensure next year’s presidential elections, which have yet to be scheduled, are neither free nor fair at the expense of the Venezuelan people fighting for democracy.”
The Treasury Department issued four new general licenses this week to suspend certain sanctions on Venezuela after the country's government and opposition formally agreed to work together on conditions for the next presidential election. The general licenses authorize certain transactions involving Venezuela's oil, gas and gold sectors and remove a trading ban on certain Venezuelan sovereign bonds and the debt and equity involving Petroleos de Venezuela (PdVSA), the country’s state-owned energy company. Treasury issued new guidance to explain the changes.
The Bureau of Industry and Security on Oct. 18 placed its two new China chip export control rules on public inspection for publication in the Federal Register, which set the effective dates for both rules (see 2310170055).
The Bureau of Industry and Security this week released a range of updates to its Oct. 7, 2022, China chip controls, unveiling two rules that will impose new license requirements on additional chips and chipmaking tools, make revisions to its U.S. persons restrictions, expand licensing requirements for exports of certain chipmaking items to U.S. arms-embargoed countries, create a new notification requirement and introduce other measures to address export control circumvention risks.
The Bureau of Industry and Security officially released the texts of two rules to update its Oct. 7, 2022, China chip controls, including an interim final rule that will update controls on certain semiconductor manufacturing items and another interim final rule that will update restrictions on certain advanced computing items, supercomputer and semiconductor end-uses and make other updates and corrections.