Category

Côte d’Ivoire

Category

On 31 January 2018, the Official Journal published Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2018/148 of 27 September 2017 amending Annexes II, III and IV to Regulation (EU) No 978/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council applying a scheme of generalised tariff preferences which revised the listings of several countries under the Generalised Scheme of Preferences (GSP), which is reviewed each January. Regulation (EU) 978/2012 provides that a country that has been classified by the World Bank as a high-income or an upper-middle income country for 3 consecutive years, or a country that benefits from a preferential market access arrangement which provides the same tariff preferences as the GSP, or better, for substantially all trade, should not benefit from GSP, although GSP benefits will continue for 1 year after entry into force of a change in status to high-income or an upper-middle income country for 3 consecutive years, and 2 years after the date of application of a preferential market access arrangement so that the GSP beneficiary country and economic operators are given sufficient time for an orderly adaptation to the country’s GSP status revision. Accordingly, the following actions have been taken:

On July 14, 2017, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) published in the Federal Register a notice providing country-by-country allocations of the Fiscal Year (FY) 2018 (October 1, 2017 through Sept. 30, 2018) in-quota quantity of the tariff-rate quotas for imported raw cane sugar, certain sugars, syrups and molasses (also known as refined sugar), specialty sugar, and sugar-containing products.

On November 4, 2016, the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) published in the Federal Register a final rule [Docket No. 160810723-6723-01] that amends the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) to implement changes in controls on arms and related materiel to Côte d’Ivoire, Liberia, Sri Lanka, and Vietnam. BIS also updates the EAR to recognize the accession of India as a member of the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR).

On September 14, 2016, the President signed an Executive Order entitled, “Termination of Emergency with Respect to the Situation in or in Relation to Côte d’Ivoire.” The Executive Order terminates the national emergency declared in  Executive Order 13396 of February 7, 2006, which was declared because the situation in or in relation to Côte d’Ivoire gave rise to the massacre of large numbers of civilians, widespread human rights abuses, significant political violence and unrest, and attacks against international peacekeeping forces leading to fatalities.