The Justice Department and Homeland Security Investigations can do more to track, analyze and disrupt illegal smuggling of guns into Mexico, the Government Accountability Office said in a March 24 report. The GAO said the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives often receives incomplete data on thousands of U.S.-origin guns recovered in Mexican states, and said “additional data and analysis” by HSI “could enhance U.S. efforts to understand firearms sources and smuggling routes.” As a result, both agencies are “unable to assess” their progress toward stopping illegal gun exports and haven’t “fully developed performance measures” for those efforts.
The Magnitsky Act is set to sunset in 2022, and the bipartisan authors of the original sanctions bill asked civil society representatives in the U.S. and Africa how the renewal should be shaped.
The government of Canada issued the following trade-related notices as of March 24 (some may also be given separate headlines):
India's Director General of Foreign Trade will allow The Plastic Export Promotion Council to authorize Certificates of Origin (Non-Preferential), the agency announced in a March 17 trade notice.
The government of Canada issued the following trade-related notices as of March 17 (some may also be given separate headlines):
The Office of Foreign Assets Control fined a Cleveland process controls and instrument manufacturer more than $215,000 for violating U.S. sanctions against Iran, OFAC said in a March 15 notice. The company, UniControl, Inc., exported goods to European companies despite knowing they would ultimately be sent to Iran, OFAC said. The agency said the company failed to “act on multiple apparent warning signs.”
Following a review of the European Union's sanctions regime on nine individuals in Egypt, the European Council removed their names from its sanctions list, the EC announced on March 12. The individuals originally were added to the sanctions' regime for their roles in the misappropriation of Egyptian state funds, the EC said. Having been found that their actions warranted their placement on the sanctions list by the council in 2011, the individuals were subject to an asset freeze and forbidden from doing business with EU nationals and legal entities. Following the most recent review, the EC determined the sanctions regime on these nine individuals had served its purpose.
Fujairah International Oil & Gas Corporation, an oil company owned by Sheikh Hamad bin Mohammed Al Sharqi, the ruler of the emirate of Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates, claims that it owns oil seized by the U.S. Filing their ownership claim in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Fujairah said it purchased the oil from an undisclosed Iraqi supplier and sold it to an unidentified Chinese buyer, where the oil was heading when it was seized. The Department of Justice alleges Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and IRGC-Qods Force, both U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organizations, schemed to deliver the oil to a customer abroad and that the origins of the oil were disguised using ship-to-ship transfers, falsified documents, and other means to trick the owners of the Liberia-flagged Achilleas -- the ship the oil was seized on -- into transporting the oil (see 2102030018).
Nine Republican senators on March 10 reintroduced a bill that they said will make the U.S. more competitive with China and counter illegal Chinese trade practices. The bill, originally introduced last year, would “tackle” Chinese efforts to “distort global markets” and allow U.S. technology companies to better compete with China by “increasing technology collaboration with allies and partners.” The bill also includes several policy statements about export controls and sanctions, and stresses that the U.S. should be “crafting multilateral export control measures” with allies and with multilateral control groups, including the Wassenaar Arrangement. Sen. James Risch, R-Idaho, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who helped craft the bill, said the legislation may have bipartisan support. “We are committed to working with our Democratic colleagues to ensure the United States and its allies and partners are prepared for this competition,” he said.
The government of Canada issued the following trade-related notices as of March 10 (some may also be given separate headlines):