World Trade Organization members are lagging in submitting required subsidy notifications, the chair of the WTO ComEighty-nine members still have yet to submit their 2021 subsidy notifications by the mid-2021 deadline, Kerrlene Wills of Guyana, the committee chair, said. Another 76 members have not yet submitted their 2019 subsidy notifications, and 65 have not submitted their 2017 notifications.
World Trade Organization members at the Oct. 24 meeting of the Committee on Safeguards reviewed 19 safeguard investigations taken by other members, the WTO said. Despite the dip in the number of new investigations and applications for new safeguards, WTO members took issue with "the way this instrument was used." China, Japan and Australia expressed concerns about the "timeliness of notifications, the effect of existing safeguard measures on trade, and the numerous extensions of measures," the WTO said.
The U.K.'s overseas territories have frozen Russian assets worth over an estimated $9 billion, including $8.4 billion by the Cayman Islands and over $400 million by the British Virgin Islands, the British government said Oct. 26. Releasing its response to the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee June 2022 report, "The cost of complacency: illicit finance and the war in Ukraine," the government also said crown dependencies have frozen assets worth over $1.15 billion, including nearly $2.2 million by the Isle of Man and nearly $5.8 million by Guernsey.
The Bureau of Industry and Security recently sent a proposed charging letter to Seagate Technology alleging that it violated U.S. export controls by providing controlled items to a company on the Entity List. Seagate said the Aug. 29 letter accused it of violating the Export Administration Regulations by providing hard disk drives to the blacklisted company and its affiliates between August 2020 and September 2021.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner, D-Va., and House Commerce Committee ranking member Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., separately raised concerns this week about Chinese government interference in DOJ’s criminal investigation of Huawei after the U.S. government charged two Chinese intelligence officers with attempting to obstruct that probe (see 2210240061).
The EU is hoping for concrete input from the U.S. by year-end on changes to the World Trade Organization’s dispute settlement system (see 2210180006), an EU official said, adding member states are growing increasingly impatient about the U.S.’s lack of action. Sabine Weyand, the European Commission’s director-general, also said the discussions within the EU on extending WTO’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS waiver) have become more difficult.
The Biden administration is weighing whether it should subject billionaire Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter and his SpaceX’s Starlink satellite network venture to national security investment reviews, Bloomberg reported Oct. 20. U.S. officials have “grown uncomfortable over Musk’s recent threat to stop supplying the Starlink satellite service to Ukraine” and what they view as his “increasingly Russia-friendly stance following a series of tweets,” the report said. Musk’s plans to buy Twitter could involve foreign investors, and the administration is reviewing whether the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. could scrutinize the deal for national security risks, the report said. A White House spokesperson didn’t comment.
The Treasury Department this week released its first ever enforcement and penalty guidelines for the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., detailing how it decides on violations, where the committee gets its information and other steps it takes during the penalty process. The committee -- which has been criticized for lacking transparency by lawyers and companies looking to comply with its requirements (see 2208050028 and 2008240031) -- also outlined various aggravating and mitigating factors it considers when calculating a penalty amount.
A bipartisan Senate bill unveiled this week could require the U.S. to impose “robust” human rights sanctions against criminal groups in Haiti. The Haiti Criminal Collusion Transparency Act of 2022, sponsored by Sens. Bob Menendez, D-N.J.; Marco Rubio, R-Fla.; and Tim Kaine, D-Va., would lead to the imposition of Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act sanctions on Haitian gang leaders and the “political and economic elites that support their activities.” The bill also would require the administration to report on gang violence in Haiti and their ties to members of the country's elite.
The Airforwarders Association and the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America say tax money is needed to underpin the air cargo industry, because of "substantial revenue shortfalls" at airports. "Because of the lagging financials, airports will be allocating the monies of the Infrastructure Act to passengers, security, and safety, leaving insufficient funds to sustain air cargo operations," the groups said Oct. 18.