In the June 27 edition of the Official Journal of the European Union the following trade-related notices were posted:

Russia renewed a ban on food imports from the U.S., European Union member states and others until Dec. 31, 2020, according to an unofficial translation of a June 24 Russian government notice and a post on the EU Sanctions blog. The ban was originally scheduled to last through Dec. 31, 2019, and also bans food imports from Canada, Australia, Norway, Iceland, Albania, Montenegro, Liechtenstein and Ukraine.

Laos recently set new certificate requirements for non-resident importers and exporters that were set to take effect June 27, according to an alert from the law firm Tilleke & Gibbons. Under the new regulation, importers and exporters in Laos that have no registered business in the country will require a Trading Rights Certificate from the Department of Import and Export in order to sell and purchase goods. The goods can’t be sold directly to consumers in Laos, and must be sold through authorized distributors. To be eligible for a certificate, the importer or exporter must operate in accordance with the laws of their country of origin, have not committed an offense or be involved in criminal proceedings related to trade or financial matters, and must come from a World Trade Organization member country.

A bipartisan effort to reduce fentanyl trafficking passed the Senate June 27 on the must-pass defense authorization bill. The amendment would dedicate some money for investigations into which Chinese companies are supplying fentanyl to the U.S. black market. It also requires sanctions on drug manufacturers in China that knowingly provide synthetic opioids to dealers, and would sanction financial institutions that assist those manufacturers or international drug cartels. However, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer's staff could not say by press time how much money would be appropriated.

Rep. Mark Green, R-Tenn., plans to introduce a bill that would increase export controls on additional goods deemed by China to be “core technologies,” and impose sanctions on foreign entities or people who violate those controls, according to a "dear colleague" letter Green sent June 26 to solicit co-sponsors. The bill, which he calls the China Technology Transfer Control Act, would “stop the Chinese military’s acquisition of sensitive American technology,” the letter said. “We should not continue to let China steal American property, only for them to turn around and use it to undermine our national security.”

Goods illegally exported through e-commerce is a subject of concern within CBP as there can be even less visibility with them than on the import side, said Daniel Randall, acting director within the Office of Field Operations at CBP, speaking June 27 at the American Association of Exporters and Importers Annual Conference in Washington. "CBP currently doesn't have the authority to collect export data," he said. "We collect export data under the [Commerce Department] authority" and the "requirements on the people who provide data are pretty loose," he said. The value of the goods has to be over $2,500 and "it's pretty much a self-declaration," he said. The main threat is with guns or gun parts, which can typically be detected through X-ray scanning, he said. Still, there's been an increase in sophistication in hiding such items for export in recent years, such as within auto parts shipments, he said. A combination of disguised goods and the self-declarations "makes things very difficult," he said.

The United Nations Security Council removed 17 entities from its Iraq sanctions list, the council said in a June 24 press release. The entities are no longer subject to asset freezes. The council did not give reasons for the removals in its press release.

The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned two Venezuelan government officials for fraud and corruption, Treasury said in a June 27 press release. OFAC is sanctioning Luis Alfredo Motta Dominguez, former minister of Electric Power and former president of the National Electric Corporation (CORPOELEC), and Eustiquio Jose Lugo Gomez, the deputy minister of Finance, Investments, and Strategic Alliances for the Ministry of Electric Power.

The advent of data privacy laws, such as Europe's General Data Protection Regulation, creates a "potential tension" with trade sanctions compliance, said Ramsey Kazem of Spark Compliance Consulting while at the American Association of Exporters and Importers Annual Conference on June 27. GDPR and other laws in various stages of implementation in U.S. states "tend to be very protective and restrictive on how you use personal data," he said. This may often conflict with sanctions laws, which require companies to do "more with the personal data that they possess in terms of screening their third-parties, screening their business partners, screening their customers," Kazem said. "So it's not difficult to see how the GDPR" and other data privacy restrictions "could conflict with, for example, U.S. sanctions laws." Further complicating the issue for companies is that "neither the U.S. nor the EU recognize the other's laws as a legitimate basis" for not complying, he said. Companies will therefore need to examine the potential risks created by such a conflict, Kazem said. "In some instances there may not be an easy answer and a company may be forced to choose between the lesser of two evils." As a result, data privacy considerations "must be at the table" while a company is developing a sanctions law compliance program, Kazem said.

Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security is looking to make more use of the enforcement authorities it was granted under the Export Control Reform Act of 2018, including more undercover operations, wiretapping and investigations, said Adrienne Frazier, a lawyer for BIS. Speaking on a panel during the American Association of Exporters and Importers Annual Conference in Washington on June 27, Frazier said BIS previously had the ability to conduct investigations in coordination with federal law enforcement. But ECRA gave BIS more individual authorities and investigative abilities, she said. “I think that those are going to be things the agency looks to do more of. It’s something that I think the agency is keen to do.”