Drawback

The U.S. is planning a sanctions campaign to target Iranian procurement programs for drones and guided missiles, The Wall Street Journal reported July 29. The sanctions could target providers of parts used to build the drones and missiles because U.S. military officials have seen a “major increase” in the use of drones against U.S. forces, the report said. The sanctions could target Iranian import channels from Russia and China, the report said. The Treasury Department and the Office of Foreign Assets Control didn’t comment.

The U.S. may need to create new, stronger tools other than its current sanctions and export controls to penalize foreign countries that violate international laws, said Nazak Nikakhtar, former acting undersecretary of the Bureau of Industry and Security. While Nikakhtar cautioned the U.S. against overusing trade restrictions, she also said they need to be bolstered because some foreign governments and companies are “easily” circumventing them.

The United Kingdom published an annual report for 2020 on its strategic export controls that includes licensing data, U.K. and EU legislation changes, and results of the Court of Appeal judgment on military exports to Saudi Arabia. In the July 21 report, the U.K. released data points such as the number of standard individual export licenses, which totaled 15,334, with 62% processed within 20 working days -- a drop from 77% in 2019. The report said 268 SIELs were refused or revoked. The publication also highlighted the resumption of trade in arms and military equipment to Saudi Arabia following the Court of Appeal judgment. The court in April OK'd a judicial review of the decision on export licensing for Saudi Arabia, the report said. The publication also touched on the Export Control Joint Unit and its 385 export control compliance checks in which 48% of first-time checked firms were compliant.

The European Council announced July 27 that additional countries aligned their sanctions regimes with the European Union's regarding restrictive measures on individuals and entities in Myanmar and in response to the annexation of Crimea. Montenegro, Albania, Norway, Ukraine and Georgia aligned with the Crimea-related sanctions. North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Ukraine and Moldova aligned with the Myanmar restrictions. The latter sanctions include eight individuals and four entities subject to restrictive measures.

Governments worldwide should persuade companies to follow “broad” due-diligence frameworks before exporting facial recognition technologies, the Center for Strategic and International Studies said in a July 27 report. The report, which maps some human rights risks associated with advanced technologies powered by artificial intelligence, said the framework should include a process to make sure companies are conducting “human rights impact assessments” before they deploy “new and potentially risky technologies.” Businesses should also assess their suppliers to ensure the technology won’t lead to “additional risks,” the report said. The U.S. warned exporters earlier this month about the risks associated with exporting facial recognition technology to China (see 2107130046), and the Commerce Department is considering new export controls on those technologies (see 2101220044).

President Joe Biden will nominate Thea Kendler, a Justice Department lawyer, to be the Commerce Department's assistant secretary for export administration, the White House announced July 28. Kendler works as a trial attorney in the Justice Department's National Security Division, Counterintelligence and Export Control Section, where she primarily prosecutes export control, economic espionage and counterintelligence cases. Kendler is also working on the U.S.'s criminal case against Huawei and its Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou, according to Reuters. Before joining the Justice Department, Kendler worked as a senior counsel for the Bureau of Industry and Security, providing legal advice on export enforcement. If confirmed, Kendler would potentially work under Alan Estevez, who was nominated by Biden earlier this month to head BIS (see 2107130004).

Iranian nationals Alireza Shavaroghi Farahani, Mahmoud Khazein, Kiya Sadeghi and Omid Noori were indicted July 13 in New York federal court for attempting to commit kidnapping, sanctions violations, bank and wire fraud, and money laundering, the Department of Justice said. The four allegedly conspired to kidnap a Brooklyn, New York, journalist for “mobilizing public opinion in Iran and around the world to bring changes to the regime's laws and practices,” DOJ said. Farahani, an Iranian intelligence officer, along with the other three, all Iranian intelligence assets, allegedly plotted to lure the journalist to a third country and kidnap the victim. Niloufar Bahadorifar, an Iranian living in California, allegedly provided financial and other services to support the plot, and faces additional charges. All are charged with a conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control issued a range of sanctions targeting people and entities in Syria and Turkey for human rights abuses or for funding terrorism, OFAC said July 28. The first set of sanctions targeted Turkey-based al-Qaida financial facilitator Hasan Al-Shaban and Syria-based terrorism fundraiser Farrukh Furkatovitch Fayzimatov. Other designations targeted eight Syrian prisons controlled by the Bashar al-Assad regime, five senior Syrian security officials, the Syrian armed group Ahrar al-Sharqiya and Syria military intelligence agencies. OFAC also revised two existing Syria-related entries on its Specially Designated Nationals List.

Congress should establish a rebuttable presumption that certain technology exports sold to China will be used to violate human rights, said Rep. Tom Malinowski, D-N.J. Malinowski, a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said he pushed to include that language in a previous House version of the Ensuring American Global Leadership and Engagement (EAGLE) Act but the wording “kept on getting stripped by the Senate” for “mysterious” reasons. “There is a very strong behind-the-scenes lobby against that from whatever elements of corporate America continue to profit from that trade,” Malinowski said in a Capitol hallway interview July 27, specifically pointing to facial recognition technology.

The Bureau of Industry and Security is “very busy” working to implement the semiconductor supply chain recommendations (see 2107140047) that arose from President Joe Biden’s February executive order (see 2102240068), including directives to pursue more collaboration with industry and a review of export controls and investment restrictions, a senior BIS official said. Sahar Hafeez, a senior adviser at BIS, said the agency will continue implementing those recommendations “in the weeks and months ahead.”