To harmonize its technical criteria on food additives with those of the European Union, Turkey has repealed the following three communiqués on the purity criteria of sweeteners, colors and other food additives and adopted a new regulation reestablishing specifications for all food additives:
The European Free Trade Association (EFTA) announced that from 4 to 6 April 2017, delegations from the EFTA States and Turkey met in Ankara for the fourth round of negotiations on the modernisation and expansion of their existing free trade agreement (FTA). The announcement said:
On 12 April 2017, Turkey notified the WTO’s Committee on Safeguards that it had initiated on 6 April a safeguard investigation on pneumatic tyres. In the notification, Turkey indicated the following:
The European Commission announced that on 21 December 2016, it asked the Council for a mandate to launch talks with Turkey to modernise the existing 20-year-old EU-Turkey Customs Union. The announcement stated:
Member countries of the World Trade Organization (WTO) are required under the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT Agreement) to report to the WTO all proposed technical regulations that could affect trade with other Member countries. The WTO Secretariat distributes this information in the form of “notifications” to all Member countries. The chart below summarizes notifications from the WTO in English received and posted by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) during the past month.
On October 10, 2016 the Russian Government issued Decree No. 1020 on the exclusion from the list of banned food products originating from Turkey the following items:
Recent Development
As noted in our previous blog on this topic, Turkey’s Council of Ministers was expected to issue an executive order outlining the implementation of a state of emergency. On Saturday, July 23, 2016, the Council of Ministers issued an executive order to take measures to reestablish public security (“Executive Order”). The scope of these measures is limited to restoring public security; as such, these measures were not implemented to regulate or impact the Turkish financial markets or economy. Considering the aim and the scope of these measures, we do not expect them to affect the business environment as a whole, save for the entities whose operations have been halted by the government for suspected terrorist associations.
On Sunday, July 24, 2016, the Prime Ministry issued a circular regarding the communication of the duties set out in the state of emergency regulations, and established a state of emergency communication council composed of ministers. According to the circular, the implementation of the state of emergency orders will be coordinated in the cities by the city governors.
Recent Development
Turkey experienced an attempted coup by a faction of the military on the night of July 15, 2016. The coup was thwarted by civilian resistance and the intervention of the police forces. As a response to the coup attempt, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced a three-month state of emergency on the night of July 20, 2016. The state of emergency came into effect following the Council of Minsters’ approval, published in Turkey’s Official Gazette on July 21, 2016. Although the current state of emergency is set for three months, the Parliament can extend the state of emergency for periods of up to four months each, upon the Council of Ministers’ request.
Russia took a decision to gradually repeal foreign trade sanctions applied to Turkey. On June 30, 2016 the Russian President issued Decree No. 314 which lifted some of the sanctions imposed on Turkey. Namely the Decree (i) provides for the resumption of charter flights between Russia and Turkey, (ii) allows Russian travel agencies to sell tours to Turkey, as well as (iii) instructs the Russian Government to hold negotiations with the Government of Turkey on…
On June 21, 2016, the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) published in the Federal Register a final rule amending the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) by adding thirty-six (36) persons to the Unverified List (the ‘‘Unverified List’’ or UVL), and adding an additional address for one (1) person currently listed on the UVL. The 36 persons are being added to the UVL on the basis that BIS could not verify their bona fides because an…