The Office of Foreign Assets Control on Sept. 16 sanctioned two entities and four people for operating as a “significant” drug trafficking organization. The designations target Zulma Maria Musso Torres, Washington Antunez Musso, Juan Carlos Reales Britto and Luis Antonio Bermudez Mejia for their involvement in drug trafficking. Antunez Musso, Reales Britto, and Bermudez Mejia report to Musso Torres, OFAC said, and help her traffic drugs at Colombian seaports. The four persons include husband and wife and the wife's two sons. OFAC also designated two Colombian entities, Exclusive Import Export S.A.S. and Poligono Santa Marta S.A.S., which are controlled by Antunez Musso and Reales Britto.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control on Sept. 16 sanctioned five al-Qaida supporters in Turkey who provide a “range of financial and travel facilitation services” to the terrorist group. The designations target Majdi Salim, Muhammad Nasr al-Din al-Ghazlani, Nurettin Muslihan, Cebrail Guzel and Soner Gurleyen.
The Biden administration is likely to increase export controls and sanctions enforcement in the next few years, Gibson Dunn lawyers said during a webinar this week. They also said the administration is likely to pursue enforcement in creative ways, including sometimes through disclosures with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S.
The United Kingdom has delayed until July 1, 2022, post-Brexit border checks on safety and security that had been scheduled to begin in January, Brexit minister David Frost said in a Sept. 14 statement. However, full customs declarations and controls will continue with their original Jan. 1 release date. The July 1 date will apply to Phytosanitary Certificates, physical checks on Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) goods at Border Control Posts, and Safety and Security declarations on imports. The pre-notification requirements of SPS goods has been extended from Oct. 1 to Jan. 1, the statement said, and the new Export Health Certificate requirements extended from Oct. 1 to July 1.
The British Parliament banned the Chinese ambassador from attending an event hosted at the legislative house in retaliation for China imposing sanctions on British lawmakers who pointed out human rights abuses in China's Xinjiang province, Reuters reported Sept. 14. China sanctioned nine British lawmakers and four businesses in March for their comments on the treatment of the Uyghur Muslim population in Xinjiang (see 2103260014). The speaker of the House of Commons, Lindsay Hoyle, and the speaker of the House of Lords, John McFall, barred Ambassador Zheng Zeguang from speaking at the event, Reuters said.
Three former U.S. intelligence community or military members -- Marc Baier, Ryan Adams and Daniel Gericke -- entered into a deferred prosecution agreement, agreeing to pay more than $1.68 million to resolve export control violation charges, the Department of Justice said. The trio worked as senior managers at a United Arab Emirates-based company that carried out computer hacking operations to benefit the UAE government during 2016 to 2019, DOJ said. All three were told repeatedly that their work constituted a “defense service” under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations, requiring a license from the State Department's Directorate of Defense Trade Controls. Nevertheless, all three continued their hacking without a license, court documents laid out.
Three members of a Florida family were charged with conspiracy to violate U.S. sanctions on Iran and money laundering, the Department of Justice said. Mohammad Faghihi, along with his wife, Farzeneh Modarresi, and sister, Faezeh Faghihi, led Florida-based Express Gene -- a company that allegedly received multiple wire transfers from accounts in Malaysia, China, Singapore, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, totaling nearly $3.5 million, between October 2016 and November 2020. Some of this money allegedly was used to buy and then ship genetic sequencing equipment to Iran without a license from the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control, DOJ said.
Senate Republicans said they will drop their objections to two Treasury Department nominees slated to oversee the agency’s sanctions work (see 2106220037) if the Biden administration sanctions the company behind the Nord Stream 2 pipeline project. In a Sept. 13 letter to Senate Banking Committee Chairman Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Senate Committee on Foreign Relations Chairman Bob Menendez, D-N.J., Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania laid out their conditions for dropping their opposition and said they are “hopeful” President Joe Biden will commit to sanctions against Nord Stream 2 AG.
The Bureau of Industry and Security should establish a blanket exemption for U.S. people and companies to participate in standards-setting bodies that have members designated on the Entity List, industry officials said. Although BIS has been working on a final rule (see 2012150037) that would clarify how export restrictions apply to the release of controlled technology at standards-setting organizations, officials from the telecommunications industry and other technology sectors are unsure how the rule’s final language will read and are concerned some of the agency’s restrictions, which they view as unnecessary, may continue.
The United Kingdom's Department for International Trade and HM Treasury will host webinars on post-Brexit international trade sanctions Sept. 21 at 10 a.m. EDT and Sept. 23 at 10 a.m. EDT.