Export Compliance Daily is providing readers with the top stories from last week in case you missed them. You can find any article by searching for the title or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
The Commerce Department is trying to find a way to screen outbound investments in a way that protects domestic commercial interests but limits collateral damage to businesses with interests outside the U.S., said Marisa Lago, the agency’s undersecretary for international trade. Lago’s comments came one day after Samm Sacks, an expert on U.S.-China technology policy issues, said the Biden administration hasn’t yet released an executive order to create an outbound investment screening regime because of discussions surrounding implementation challenges.
The U.K.'s Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation in a pair of Feb. 10 notices added three entries to its global anti-corruption sanctions regime and corrected two entries under its cyber sanctions list. Listings for Vasil Kroumov Bozhkov, Delyan Slavchev Peevski and Ilko Dimitrov Zhelyazkov -- all Bulgarian nationals -- were added to the global anti-corruption restrictions, subjecting the individuals to an asset freeze and travel ban.
The Bureau of Industry and Security this week suspended the export privileges of two Canadian residents after they tried to ship controlled goods without the required licenses.
Deepwater port projects off the coast of Texas are being “unnecessarily” delayed by the Transportation Department’s Maritime Administration, hindering applications that could help the U.S. export more oil and natural gas, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said in a Feb. 13 letter to the agency. Cruz said the Maritime Administration “is going more than three years on average before issuing a deepwater port licensing decision -- almost three times as long as is statutorily permitted.” Although the projects are “complex,” applicants have “complained of prolonged delays associated with the Maritime Administration’s slow processing time and general lack of communication during the process,” the senator said.
The U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council has done some excellent work in technology, according to EU and U.S. trade officials, but it needs to tackle the "trade" part of its mission more directly. A discussion on Making a More Meaningful TTC also included executives from two technology industry associations, who were somewhat less laudatory about its results so far.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week published previously issued general licenses under its Global Terrorism Sanctions Regulations and two sets of licenses under its Venezuela sanctions program. The full text of each license appears in the respective notice.
Experts disagreed on the effectiveness of the Russian oil price cap during a Feb. 13 panel discussion hosted by the Atlantic Council.
The U.K. adopted the U.N.'s humanitarian exemption across 14 of its sanctions regimes. The exemption allows certain organizations to deliver humanitarian assistance without violating U.N. asset freezes.
Kambiz Attar Kashani, a dual citizen of the U.S. and Iran, was sentenced Feb. 9 to 30 months in prison for "conspiring to illegally export U.S. goods and technology to users in Iran, including the Central Bank of Iran, in violation of the International Economic Powers Act," DOJ announced. The Central Bank of Iran has supported designated terrorist organizations, including the Lebanese Hezbollah and the Qods Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, according to the U.S. government.