Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer met with U.K. Secretary of State for Business and Trade Jonathan Reynolds and the British prime minister's Special Adviser on Business and Investment Varun Chandra on March 18 to discuss a potential bilateral trade deal, the Commerce Department announced. The meeting follows U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer's visit to the White House last month. Lutnick expressed the Trump administration's desire for a trade deal, and Commerce said efforts to develop it "will continue to unfold over the coming days and weeks."

The U.K. amended the sanctions listing of Red Box Energy Services under its Russia sanctions regime on March 20. The entity's listing now says the company "has been involved" in the Russian energy sector instead of saying it "is involved" in the sector.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week sanctioned an oil refinery and its CEO for buying and refining hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of Iranian crude oil, including from vessels linked to the Yemen-based Houthis.

It’s still unclear how the Trump administration will approach the Bureau of Industry and Security's artificial intelligence diffusion rule or any of the agency’s recently published proposed or interim final rules that haven’t yet taken effect, a Commerce Department official said.

The Bureau of Industry and Security has begun to experience a significant decline in export license applications for Australia and the U.K. as a result of a rule it issued last year to reduce defense-related licensing requirements for those countries, a Commerce Department official said March 19.

A new automated tool that allows the Bureau of Industry and Security to screen license applications against certain U.S. government intelligence information could lead to an uptick in license denials, a Commerce Department official said.

Colombia formally accepted the World Trade Organization Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies on March 19, bringing the number of countries that have accepted the deal to 93. The WTO needs 18 more countries to accept to get to two-thirds of the membership, the threshold for the agreement to take effect.

The European Commission on March 19 imposed definitive antidumping duties on glass fiber yarns from China after finding that "significant Chinese overcapacity" of the yarn injured the EU industry. The duties range from 26.3% to 56.1%.

The EU plans to update its export controls to make them more effective amid rapid geopolitical and technological change, a government official said March 19.

The State Department approved a possible $165 million military sale to Australia, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency said this week. The sale includes "Countermeasures, Chaff, and Impulse Cartridges" and related equipment; principal contractors will be Kilgore Flares, Armtec Countermeasures, Alloy Surface and CCI Capco.