The Biden administration should “make full use” of its sanctions and export control authorities against Iran for transferring weapons and other military items to Russia, the ranking Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee said in a Nov. 1 letter to the White House. Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas said Iran has sent hundreds of “lethal Mohajer-6 and Shahed-136 drones, as well as related technology and military advisors” to Russia since it invaded Ukraine, and is reportedly preparing to provide “Fateh-100 and Zolfaghar” ballistic missiles.
The top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee is asking the Commerce Department to provide its licensing data and communications with chip companies, along with a broad swathe of related information, to make sure the agency is implementing its new China controls “fairly across all market players.”
The Bureau of Industry and Security will likely add more entities involved in China’s supercomputing and semiconductor manufacturing industry to the Entity List, said Thea Kendler, BIS’s assistant secretary for export administration. “We view advanced chip manufacturing and supercomputer activities in China as a national security concern,” Kendler said during a Nov. 2 Information Systems Technical Advisory Committee meeting. “So I expect that there will be Entity List additions.”
Akerman LLP added two partners to its ranks, with Matthew Goldstein joining the Washington, D.C.-based Government Affairs and Public Policy practice, and Andrew Dominguez joining the International Litigation and Arbitration practice in Miami, the firm announced.
Thirty-four World Trade Organization members have submitted 225 notifications pertaining to COVID-19 to the Committee on Technical Barriers to Trade, making up 46% of all COVID-19-related WTO notifications, the WTO Secretariat said in a note. These notifications primarily deal with the "extraordinary and temporary streamlining of certification and related procedures and the introduction of new regulatory requirements for medical goods in response to the pandemic." Most of the notifications, 68%, covered regulations on medical goods including personal protective equipment, pharmaceuticals and medical devices. The note said that since the TBT Committee's May 2020 meeting, WTO members referred to the pandemic in 54 trade concerns, most of which were not linked to COVID-19-related notifications or medical goods but the impacts of the pandemic on the members' economies.
The State Department should sanction entities in Tunisia undermining the country’s stability, said Sens. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., and Jim Risch, R-Idaho, the chair and ranking member, respectively, of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The lawmakers said President Kais Saied’s recent constitutional referendum was a “vast expansion of presidential powers and drastically diminished the Tunisian people’s ability to elect their own government.” The U.S. should work with G7 partners to “address the erosion of Tunisian democracy and mitigate the effects of the country’s economic crisis,” the Oct. 16 letter said.
U.S. technology companies should make use of a Treasury Department license that authorizes certain communication-related transactions with Iran, a bipartisan group of lawmakers said last week. General License D2, issued in September (see 2209230037), can help Iranians obtain tools and access communication services to help them “circumvent government blockages,” the lawmakers said in an Oct. 27 letter to Google, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft and Digital Ocean. The companies should be more “proactive in acting pursuant to the broad authorization provided in GLD-2,” said the letter, signed by Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., the chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, along with Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and others.
A Republican-backed bill introduced in the House could lead to the transfer of export control authorities from the Commerce Department to the Defense Department. The bill, introduced Oct. 28 by Reps. Jim Banks, R-Ind., Rob Wittman, R-Va., and Greg Steube, R-Fla., includes language critical of the Bureau of Industry and Security, saying the agency has made “little progress” in controlling emerging and foundational technologies under the Export Control Reform Act and that BIS’s export control authorities should be revoked.
U.S.-based TuSimple Holdings, which provides self-driving truck and autonomous freight shipping technology, is being investigated for whether it illegally transferred technology to a Chinese startup, The Wall Street Journal reported Oct. 30. The U.S. company is being probed by the FBI, the SEC and the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., which are examining its “relationship” with Hydron, the report said. Hydron is an autonomous truck startup led by one of TuSimple’s co-founders. The agencies are examining whether TuSimple shared with Hydron “intellectual property developed in the U.S.” and whether that “defrauded TuSimple investors by sending valuable technology to an overseas adversary,” the report said.
The Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. should conduct a review of Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter, Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said on Twitter. CFIUS should investigate the “national security implications” of the deal, Murphy said Oct. 31, specifically Saudi Arabia’s role in the acquisition. Bloomberg recently reported (see 2210210018) that CFIUS could exercise its jurisdiction over the deal due to the “presence of foreign investors in Musk’s consortium,” which includes Prince Alwaleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia.