On October 16, the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) announced that exporters can request six-month extensions of export licenses that are set to expire on or before December 31, 2020. According to BIS, this is being done to “cut[] red tape and mak[e] it easier for exporters to drive our Nation’s economic recovery in the wake of the pandemic.” Exporters can request the extension by emailing LicenseExtensionRequest@bis.doc.gov. The original license will be…
On September 24, 2020, the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) published a Final Rule in the Federal Resister that amended the Cuban Assets Control Regulations (CACR) to further implement the President’s foreign policy to deny the Cuban regime sources of revenue. Major elements of the changes include: Professional (Including Business) Meetings and Conferences: The Final Rule amends a CACR general license to eliminate the authorization for CACR parties to attend or organize professional (including business)…
On September 21, 2020, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) pushed back the submission deadline for comments related to the letter of attestation process for exports of certain personal protection equipment (PPE). FEMA published the request for comments in July 2020 but reportedly did not receive any. The export restrictions and letter of attestation process was created earlier this year in response to potential shortages of certain kinds of PPE as a result of the…
On August 27, 2020, the US Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) issued a final rule (“Final Rule”) adding 24 Chinese state-owned entities to the Entity List (the “SCS Designees”), including several subsidiaries of China Communications Construction Company (CCCC), due to their ties to land reclamation efforts involving artificial islands in the South China Sea. In a press statement released with the designations, the Commerce Department cited the role played by the SCS Designees in building and militarizing…
On August 13, 2020, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued a statement requesting that the US Department of Transportation (DOT) suspend private charter flights to all Cuban airports. This action will suspend all charter flights between the United States and Cuba over which the DOT exercises jurisdiction, except for authorized public charter flights to and from Havana and other private charter flights authorized for limited purposes. Secretary Pompeo’s statement cites the Administration’s intent to deny economic resources to…
On July 24, 2020, the Trump Administration announced a new policy (the “Updated UAS Policy”) on exports of US-origin unmanned aerial systems (UAS), also known as “drones.” The Updated UAS Policy follows the Trump Administration’s UAS policy reforms announced in April 2018 (“April 2018 UAS Export Policy”), which allowed exports of certain US-origin armed and unarmed UAS to occur via direct sales between US companies and foreign end users. Our previous blog post on the April 2018 UAS…
The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) recently designated as Specially Designated Nationals (“SDNs”) a number of entities linked to the Iranian steel, aluminum, and iron sectors that are likely to be of particular interest for companies doing trade in or with the Middle East or financial institutions financing trade and business in the region. This article highlights OFAC’s recent action and outlines some practical considerations. On 25 June 2020,…
On June 17, 2020, the President signed the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act of 2020 into law. The law authorizes the President to impose sanctions on persons, including Chinese government officials, determined to be responsible for certain human rights violations and abuses committed against Muslim minority groups in China or elsewhere. The law requires the administration to sanction those individuals by blocking their assets and declaring them ineligible for visas or admission to the United States. The President may…
On June 3, 2020, the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued new Syria-Related Sanctions Regulations (the “Regulations”), effective June 5, 2020 (when published in the Federal Register), to implement Executive Order 13894 (“EO 13894”) issued by the President on October 14, 2019 in light of Turkey’s military actions in Syria. The Regulations are a codification of EO 13894 and do not represent new sanctions against Syria. They are also separate from US comprehensive…
On May 14, 2020, the US Department of State, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), and the US Coast Guard issued guidance to the private sector aimed at preventing deceptive shipping practices used in sanctions evasion, smuggling, facilitation of terrorism, and other criminal activity (the “Advisory”). The Advisory focuses on tactics recently used by malign actors to evade sanctions and sets out a non-exhaustive list of best practices companies may wish…