A World Trade Organization arbitrator determined the methodology Canada can use to set the level of retaliatory measures it can impose on goods imported from the U.S. if the U.S. applies countervailing duties on Canadian goods based on a measure found to be inconsistent with WTO rules. In the July 13 decision, the arbitrator said Canada would set the appropriate level of nullification or impairment in the future "based on the four-variety Armington model," which was recommended by the U.S. and can quantify the trade decline experienced by Canada through a particular use of the U.S.'s adverse facts available measures in CVD proceedings.
The U.S. will ramp up sanctions pressure against Iran if it doesn’t return to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, said Jake Sullivan, President Joe Biden’s national security adviser. Sullivan also said Iran is preparing to send weapons technology to Russia in violation of international export controls.
Although tensions over Mexico's discouragement of foreign investment in its energy sector and the perennial problem of migration are likely to be front and center, panelists at a Wilson Center Mexico Institute program previewing the Mexican president's visit to Washington said nearshoring ought to be a focus as well.
The State Department published its spring 2022 regulatory agenda, including a new mention of a final rule that will expand the types of defense items and services that can be sent to Australia, the U.K. and Canada. The rule would specifically amend the International Traffic in Arms Regulations to expand certain trade under existing defense trade treaties between the countries, and would also amend the Canadian exemptions. Other changes will make “clarifying amendments and conforming updates” to Supplement No. 1 to part 126 of the ITAR, specifically to U.S. Munitions List Categories IV(i), manufacturing know-how, and Category XII, night vision entries. The agency hopes to issue the rule this month.
Export controls may not stop all illegal shipments, but that doesn’t mean the U.S. and others should not work to improve cooperation and coordination, experts agreed during a June 27 Brookings Institution panel.
The U.S. this week announced a host of new sanctions targeting Russia’s defense industrial base, including export restrictions against entities helping Moscow evade U.S. export controls and new financial sanctions targeting state-owned companies. The sanctions target more than 100 entities and 50 people supporting Russia’s defense industry and add 36 entities to the Commerce Department’s Entity List, including six for supporting Russia’s military.
Kazakhstan recently extended its wheat flour export restrictions until Sept. 30, USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service said in a report last week. Kazakhstan also added 550,000 metric tons of wheat to the original 1 million metric ton quota, and 370,000 metric tons of wheat flour to the original 300,000 metric tons quota. The country first imposed the restrictions, which were set to expire June 15 (see 2204290010), to ensure domestic “food security” amid Russia’s war in Ukraine.
The World Trade Organization launched a Trade Connectivity Heatmap to provide a broad overview of the trade relationships between various economies across product categories, the WTO announced June 24. The map uses bilateral trade flow data from over 180 economies aggregated into around 70 product types to allow users to zero in on data for bilateral product-by-product relationships. The map allows for the organization of data based on four indicators: imports from a selected economy as a share of other economies' total imports in a chosen product category, exports meant for the selected economy as a share of other economies' total exports, the selected economy's imports originating from other economies as a share of the selected country's imports in the selected product category, and a selected country's exports meant for other economies as a share of the selected country's exports in the chosen product category.
Vietnam seized four tons of dried tamarind suspected of being smuggled through a district bordering with Cambodia, the state-run CustomsNews reported June 24. An anti-smuggling team working with local police discovered the goods while inspecting a fruit barn in the Tinh Bien district. The team found 400 boxes of dried tamarind from a foreign country, CustomsNews said. The barn's owner did not have the boxes' invoices and documents proving their origin, though he said he bought them in the Xuan Hoa hamlet. The anti-smuggling team verified this was not the case, and turned the case over to the Tinh Bien District Police for additional investigation.
The Singapore State Court sentenced Ho Shyan Tien, a Singaporean national, to eight months in prison and levied a $4.4 million (in Singapore dollars) fine for evading the Goods and Services Tax on imports of various goods between 2015 and 2019, Singapore Customs announced June 24. Ho, the only director of freight forwarding company Sea-Net Cargo Express, pleaded guilty to six charges of evading GST on the imports.