The 25 percent Section 232 tariffs on Canadian steel and the 10 percent tariffs on aluminum will be removed within 48 hours, Canada and the U.S. said May 17. When the metals tariffs are removed, Canada will also roll back its retaliatory tariffs, which hit American metals and agriculture, as well as some prepared food. The joint statement said stricter customs enforcement to prevent transshipment will be coordinated between Canada and the U.S.
President Donald Trump said May 17 said the U.S. has also reached an agreement with Mexico to drop U.S. Section 232 tariffs. The Mexican government issued a statement that said it would be lifting all its retaliatory tariffs in response. Mexico had targeted U.S. pork, dairy and metals. Mexican President Andres Lopez Obrador noted in the statement that this agreement will allow the countries to move forward with ratifying the new NAFTA, which is known in that country as the Treaty between Mexico, the United States and Canada, or T-MEC, for the Spanish acronym. The Mexican statement did not say how quickly the tariffs and retaliatory tariffs would be lifted. A joint statement from Canada and the U.S. said tariffs would end under a similar agreement within 48 hours.
The World Customs Organization issued the following releases on commercial trade and related matters:
In the May 15 edition of the Official Journal of the European Union the following trade-related notices were posted:
The European Union is ending its antidumping duties imposed on imports of bioethanol from the U.S., it said in a notice. Ending the AD duty order likely wouldn’t cause a recurrence of dumping by U.S. exporters, the EU said. The repeal takes effect May 16. The duties had originally been imposed in 2013 at a rate of €62.30 ($69.80) per metric ton.
The "annual interest rate for the third quarter of 2019 (July 1st 2019 to 30 September 2019) will be 1.6661," the Canada Border Services Agency said in a May 15 email. That rate affects "all importers and brokers who submit their B3s and AO notification of release queries using the CCS/CADEX system," the agency said.
During a House Financial Services subcommittee hearing on U.S. sanctions, several panelists painted a grave picture of the state of U.S.-imposed sanctions on Russia, calling for additional, stronger measures and criticizing the Trump administration's removal of sanctions from several Russian companies in January. “You’ve asked whether the current sanctions policy is effective, especially as it relates to Russia,” Daleep Singh, a senior fellow for the Center for a New American Security, told the Subcommittee on National Security, International Development and Monetary Policy on May 15. “Forgive me for being blunt, but my answer right now is 'no.'”
The Trump administration extended for one year beyond May 16 the existing national emergency with respect to threats to U.S. national security posed by Yemen, the White House said in a May 13 press release, continuing a 2012 executive order that sanctioned Yemen political and military leaders that “threaten the peace, security, or stability” of that country. In the press release, the White House said certain former government of Yemen officials “continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat” to U.S. foreign policy and national security.
Ukraine announced a series of economic sanctions against Russia that increased duty rates on a variety of imported goods and implemented an embargo on Russian cement and plywood, according to an unofficial translation of May 15 press releases from the Ukraine government.
The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security is looking for new members for its seven Technical Advisory Committees, the agency said in a notice. The TACs "advise the Department of Commerce on the technical parameters for export controls applicable to dual-use items (commodities, software, and technology) and on the administration of those controls." Six of the TACs are focused on the technical parameters of export controls, and the seventh is focused on the regulations and procedures, BIS said. The members are chosen by the Commerce secretary and must obtain secret-level clearances, it said. Nominations are due by June 15 and should go to Yvette.Springer@bis.doc.gov.