Export Compliance Daily is providing readers with the top stories for July 6-9 in case you missed them. You can find any article by searching on the title or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
The U.S. updated its Xinjiang Supply Chain Business Advisory, highlighting the increasing supply chain, sanctions, labor and export control risks of doing business in the Xinjiang region. The July 13 update, which builds and expands on the original advisory issued last year (see 2007010040), says China is committing genocide through its human rights violations against Muslim minorities, provides guidance to businesses that may invest in implicated Chinese companies, updates a list of U.S. enforcement actions related to Xinjiang and "strengthens" recommendations for companies that risk doing business in the region.
President Joe Biden nominated Alan Estevez, a former Obama administration Pentagon official, to lead the Bureau of Industry and Security, the White House announced July 13. Estevez is currently a defense and security consultant with Deloitte Consulting after serving as the principal deputy undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology, and logistics and representing the Defense Department on the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. Estevez didn’t respond to a request for comment.
The United Kingdom's Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation updated two listings under its Belarus sanctions regime in a July 12 notice. The listings for Leanid Mikalaievich Churo and the Belaeronavigatsia Republican Unitary Air Navigation Services Enterprise, of which Churo is an employee, were amended to change the word "Unity" to "Unitary" in the entity's name. Both are still subject to an asset freeze.
The United Kingdom's Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation amended the Syria sanctions listing of Salam Tohme in a July 12 financial sanctions notice. The update changed Tohme's listed gender from Female to Male. Tohme is still subject to an asset freeze.
The European Parliament adopted three resolutions on the human rights situation in Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia and Iran, calling for sanctions on the three nations, according to a July 8 press release. The parliament strongly condemned the forced closure of the Apple Daily newspaper in Hong Kong and recommended sanctions on "individuals and entities responsible." The parliament also called for the cessation of the harassment and intimidation of journalists and the attempted muzzling of pro-democracy activists.
The European Union General Court dismissed a case from Iranian national Naser Bateni, who sought 250,000 euros in damages from his sanctions listings in 2011, 2012 and 2013, according to a July 7 judgment. Previous decisions from the court had annulled Bateni's listings for those years, finding that the European Council did not establish grounds that justified the designations and prompting the damages claim from Bateni. The court said that the council did not commit a "sufficiently serious breach" -- the standard for providing damages -- by relying on the information available to it when it made Bateni's sanctions determination. "The Council did not depart from the behavior which a normally prudent and diligent administration would have adopted," the judgment said. Bateni's appeal was "dismissed as being partly inadmissible and partly unfounded," according to an unofficial translation of the judgment.
The European Council extended for six months sanctions targeting certain economic sectors of Russia for their actions in destabilizing Ukraine, according to a July 12 press release. The sanctions, which were extended until Jan. 31, 2022, were first implemented on July 31, 2014 and consist of limiting access to EU primary and secondary capital markets for particular Russian banks and companies, and blocking forms of financial assistance and brokering directed toward Russian financial entities. The sanctions also bar the trading of defense materials and dual-use goods for military use or military end-users in Russia.
The Treasury Department issued a new general license authorizing certain exports and reexports of oil to the Venezuelan government and Petroleos de Venezuela, the country’s state-run energy company. General License No. 40, issued July 12, authorizes transactions related to indirect or direct exports and reexports of liquefied natural gas to PdVSA and any entity it owns by 50% or more. The transactions are authorized through 12:01 a.m. July 8, 2022.
Switzerland added 78 individuals and seven entities to its sanctions regime on Belarus, the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs said in a July 7 news release. The move brings Switzerland in line with the European Union's entries on the same individuals and entities.