The Commerce Department Bureau of Industry and Security is seeking comments on an information collection used to respond to congressional and industry requests to make “foreign availability determinations” about the Export Administration Regulations, according to a notice. In the information collection, exporters are urged to submit data to “support the contention” that items controlled for national security reasons are “available-in-fact, from a non-U.S. source, in sufficient quantity and of comparable quality so as to render the control ineffective.” Comments are due Feb. 10.
A bipartisan bill aimed at sanctioning fentanyl traffickers will be included in the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act expected to pass early next week, according to a Dec. 11 press release from Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Tom Cotton, R-Ark. The bill was passed in the Senate in June as part of the must-pass defense authorization bill (see 1906270054). In addition to sanctioning Chinese and other fentanyl traffickers, the Fentanyl Sanctions Act would urge the Trump administration to pursue multilateral sanctions with U.S. partners and to create a commission to report on how to better control shipments of synthetic opioids.
The State Department sanctioned Saudi and Chechen government officials for human rights violations, the agency said Dec. 10. The targets include Mohammed al Otaibi, former consul general of Saudi Arabia in Turkey, and Aslan Iraskhanov, head of the Ministry of Interior Affairs for the city of Grozny in the Chechen Republic of the Russian Federation.
The State Department sanctioned two former Paraguayan government officials due to “significant corruption,” the State Department said Dec. 10. The agency’s sanctions targeted former president of Paraguay’s judicial disciplinary board and senator Oscar Gonzalez Daher and former attorney general Javier Diaz Veron. Also sanctioned were Daher’s immediate family (Nelida Chaves de Gonzalez, Oscar Ruben Gonzalez Chaves and Maria Gonzalez Chaves) and Veron’s family (Maria Selva Morinigo, Yeruti Diaz Morinigo, Manuel Diaz Morinigo, Alejandro Diaz Morinigo and Veron’s minor child).
The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned an Iranian shipping network, its leader and three Mahan Air sales agents, Treasury said in a Dec. 11 press release. The shipping network illegally smuggled “lethal aid” from Iran to Yemen on behalf of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force, Treasury said, and the three sales agents, based in the United Arab Emirates and Hong Kong, were targeted for working for a sanctioned Iranian airline.
President Donald Trump will nominate Jessie Liu to be undersecretary for Terrorism and Financial Crimes, a key sanctions role within the Treasury Department, the White House said Dec. 10. Liu is the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia and previously served as deputy general counsel for Treasury and in the Justice Department’s National Security Division. The position was previously held by Sigal Mandelker, who resigned in October (see 1910020061).
U.S. companies are encountering issues when trying to return faulty products to parties on the Entity List, members said during a Dec. 10 Regulations and Procedures Technical Advisory Committee meeting. The problem occurs after companies legally import goods -- which later turn out to be defective -- from an Entity List party, the members said. The goods are not able to be easily exported for return, they said.
In the Dec. 10 edition of the Official Journal of the European Union the following trade-related notices were posted:
The European Union is working on a sanctions regime to target human rights violations, Josep Borrell, the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy, said Dec. 9. Borrell said the EU is launching “preparatory work” for the regime at the request of “several” EU member states, adding that the regime will be the “EU equivalent” of U.S. Global Magnitsky Act sanctions. “This will be a tangible step reaffirming the European Union’s global lead on human rights,” he said.
The European Union maintained some sanctions and lifted certain sanctions from officials in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the EU Council said Dec. 9. The move includes lifting sanctions on two people on the DRC sanctions list: Roger Kibelisa and Lambert Mende, according to a Dec. 9 post on the European Sanctions blog.