Counterfeit goods made up as much as 6.8 percent of total imports into the European Union in 2016, up from 5 percent just three years earlier, mirroring a worldwide increase in trade in counterfeits, the European Union Intellectual Property Office said in a new report. China remained the world’s top shipper of counterfeits, though Hong Kong plays an increasing role as a transit point, and “India, Malaysia, Mexico, Singapore, Thailand, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates remain among the top provenance economies,” the report said.
The government of Canada recently issued the following trade-related notices for March 18 (note that some may also be given separate headlines):
Oleg Deripaska, a Russian businessman who was sanctioned by the U.S. in 2018, sued the Treasury Department last week, alleging its sanctions rely on “unsubstantiated” allegations and have led to the “utter devastation” of his “wealth, reputation, and economic livelihood,” according to court documents. The suit, filed March 15, requests that the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia order Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control to remove the sanctions. It names Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, Treasury Department OFAC Director Andrea Gacki, the Treasury Department and OFAC as defendants.
In the March 15 edition of the Official Journal of the European Union the following trade-related notices were posted:
The Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control published updates to its Specially Designated Nationals List by listing nine people associated with Venezuela, according to two OFAC notices. Both notices, which will be published in the Federal Register, announce sanctions that were issued last month. The first notice lists four people with ties to Venezuela whose sanctions were first announced by OFAC on Feb. 25, and the second notice lists five people associated with Venezuela whose sanctions were announced Feb. 15.
The Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control amended a general license related to U.S. sanctions on Venezuela, according to a March 14 OFAC notice. The license allows transactions with PDV Holding and CITGO Holding, two oil companies and subsidiaries of Petroleos de Venezuela, the U.S.-sanctioned and Venezuela state-owned oil company. The license also allows transactions with PDV Holding’s and CITGO Holding’s subsidiaries. The license changes the expiration date to automatically renew on the first day of each month, the notice said, and is “valid for a period of 18 months from the effective date” of the general license “or the date of any subsequent renewal of (the license), whichever is later.” The license, General License No. 7A, replaces General License No. 7, which was issued Jan. 28.
North Korea is using "increasingly advanced" ship-to-ship transfers to get around global sanctions on the country, the United Nations said in a recent report. Those techniques include "the disguising of vessels through ship identity theft and false Automatic Identification System (AIS) transmissions," the U.N. said. Other methods "include physical disguise of tankers of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the use of small, unregistered vessels, illegal name-changing and other forms of identity fraud, night transfers and the use of additional vessels for transshipment," the report said.
The U.S., the European Union and Canada announced additional Russian sanctions stemming from Russia's actions in Ukraine, according to media reports and a March 15 announcement by the U.S. Treasury Department. Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control added six people and eight entities to its Specially Designated Nationals List, OFAC said in a notice, while Canada reportedly imposed sanctions on 114 people and 15 entities and the EU targeted eight security service officials and military commanders. Individuals or companies who trade with any of the blocked people or entities may be penalized under U.S. sanctions.
The Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control made changes to one of its sanctions lists, replacing the List of Foreign Financial Institutions Subject to Part 561 with the List of Foreign Financial Institutions Subject to Correspondent Account or Payable-Through Account (CAPTA) Sanctions, OFAC said in a March 14 notice. The new list contains foreign entities “for which the opening or maintaining of a correspondent account or a payable-through account” in the U.S. is restricted, OFAC said. Foreign entities on the list are subject to the Ukraine Freedom Support Act of 2014, the North Korea Sanctions Regulations, the Iranian Financial Sanctions Regulations and the Hizballah International Financing Prevention Act of 2015. OFAC also amended the Iran and Hizballah financial sanctions regulations to include references to CAPTA, the agency said.
The United Kingdom would temporarily set tariffs at zero for nearly 90 percent of imported goods should it leave the European Union with no transition deal in place, the U.K. Department for International Trade said in a March 13 press release announcing a draft tariff and customs scheme in the run-up to a vote in Parliament on whether to leave with no deal.