Jacob Kopnick

A 55-year-old man has been extradited to the U.S. from Malaysia, making him the first North Korean national to be brought to the states to face a criminal charge, the Department of Justice announced in a March 22 news release. Mun Chol Myong, a North Korean businessman, is charged with laundering money through the U.S. financial system to provide luxury items to North Korea. Mun allegedly defrauded U.S. banks for years and violated sanctions on the oppressive North Korean regime in amounts exceeding $1.5 million, according to recently unsealed court documents. He also was allegedly affiliated with the Reconnaissance Geneal Bureau, North Korea's chief intelligence organization. He made his first appearance March 22 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, where he had been indicted May 2, 2019, on six counts of money laundering. Mun was arrested in Malaysia May 14, 2019.

Canada and the United Kingdom will look to ratify their Trade Continuity Agreement by April 1, Canadian International Trade Minister Mary Ng announced in a March 19 press release. Having established a Memorandum of Understanding in December to continue preferential tariff rates through the Brexit process, Canada and the U.K. have decided to ratify the short-term agreement and move on to future negotiations on a more ambitious free trade agreement. The TCA gives Canadian exporters continued preferential access to the U.K. market with 98% of Canadian products receiving tariff-free admission to the Kingdom. According to the corresponding press release from Britain's International Trade Secretary Liz Truss, the agreement ensures the elimination of tariffs on beef, fish, chocolate bars and soft drinks and the eventual zero tariffs on cars. The agreement will save an estimated 42 million GB pounds on tariffs, the release said.

Florida resident Victor Mones Coro was sentenced to 55 months in prison for violating U.S. sanctions on Venezuela by chartering private flights for top Venezuelan officials, the Department of Justice said March 17. Sentenced in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, Mones Coro provided millions of dollars in charter flight services to former Venezuelan Vice President Tareck El Aissami, his frontman Samark Lopez Bello, Venezuelan Supreme Court President Maikel Moreno and President Nicolas Maduro's 2018 campaign for president. The chartered flights violate the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctions on the Venezuelan officials for their role in subverting democracy and proliferating authoritarianism. Mones Coro also will pay a $250,000 fine and serve two years of supervised release.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called for “reciprocity” and “proportionality” in the European Union's COVID-19 vaccine export regime, at a March 17 press conference. To incentivize greater openness in other countries' vaccine exports, von der Leyen placed a special emphasis on reciprocity, detailing how the EU is prioritizing exporting vaccines to countries that create their own vaccines. “We think this is an invitation to be open,” she said. “So that we also see exports from those countries coming back to the European Union.”

Chinese regulators are considering a new tax on light-cycle oil imports, a low-quality petroleum input that's blended into diesel and fuel oil, Bloomberg reported March 17. The Chinese government asked for feedback from energy companies on a draft plan and could be ready to implement the tax as soon as the first half of 2021, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the discussions. Currently, LCO imports are exempt from China's fuel consumption tax. Demand for LCO imports skyrocketed in 2020 as China ramped up infrastructure projects to stimulate its COVID-ravaged economy, bringing most of the LCO in from South Korea, the report said.

Disappointed with the pace of the United Kingdom government's response on forced labor issues in China's Xinjiang region, parliamentarians on the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee issued a report on the situation, including policy recommendations on how to further crack down on modern slavery in Xinjiang. The BEIS Committee, responsible for oversight of the BEIS Department, issued sweeping recommendations for the government agency for its role in upholding human rights commitments in relation to business ties with China. The March 17 report declared that the BEIS Department “has shown little sign that it is taking a proactive or meaningful lead on investigating UK business links to forced labour and other human rights abuses in China or elsewhere.”

The Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control will allow for stock in Luokung Technology to be traded on U.S. exchanges until May 8, the company said in a March 11 news release. Luokung was previously designated as a Chinese military company and was scheduled for delisting on the NASDAQ on March 15. The company is fighting the designation in court, though a temporary restraining order request was dropped at Luokung's request due to the OFAC decision on March 11. Another Chinese company, Xiaomi, was recently granted a preliminary injunction over its designation (see 2103150035). Due to news of the court ruling in Xiaomi's favor, Luokung's stock shot up March 15, according to a press report on the NASDAQ website.

The European Union notified the United Kingdom about its breaching of provisions of the Protocol on Ireland and Northern Ireland in the withdrawal agreement signed following Britain's departure from the EU. The March 15 letter of formal notice said the U.K. has violated the terms of the Ireland and Northern Ireland provisions regarding the movement of goods and pet travel, the European Commission said in a March 16 news release. The EU gave the U.K. a month to respond to the notice. The EU is challenging the U.K.'s extension of the Brexit grace period on food imports to Northern Ireland. EC Vice President Maros Sefcovic sent a separate letter to David Frost, U.K. co-chair of the Joint Committee, calling on the U.K. to end the Brexit grace period and imploring “good faith” consultations with the Joint Committee.

The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia temporarily blocked Chinese consumer electronics giant Xiaomi's designation as a Chinese military company, in a March 12 ruling. Judge Rudolph Contreras said the Department of Defense's decision to designate Xiaomi, thus forbidding U.S. citizens from purchasing Xiaomi securities, lacked substantial evidence. He said DOD provided an “inadequate” explanation as to why its decision was made and the source of authority for making the designation.

With large purchase agreements yet to be filled, the European Union extended its vaccine export control regime until the end of June, the European Commission announced March 11. The controls apply only to companies with which the EU has negotiated an advance purchase agreement and require these companies to notify their member state authorities of their intention to export COVID-19 vaccines. To date, only one export of vaccines has been denied, with the EU blocking a shipment of more than 250,000 vaccine doses from British vaccine developer AstraZeneca to Australia (see 2103080006). The EC said it has granted 249 export requests to 31 different countries for a total of over 34 million doses since they did not threaten underlying APAs with the EU.