Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said July 29 that he’s considering “different options” for placing conditions on removing U.S. sanctions on Syria.
The U.N. Security Council this week unanimously agreed to renew its sanctions regime targeting non-state armed groups and people operating in the Central African Republic. The sanctions were renewed for one year, extending them until July 31, 2026.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control has renewed a sanctions waiver for Serbia’s majority-Russian-owned oil company NIS, an entity designated in January for its ties to Russian oil firm Gazprom Neft. At the request of Serbia's Mining and Energy agency, the U.S. now has extended a waiver for the designation five times since January, Serbian Energy Minister Dubravka Djedovic Handanovic said July 27, according to an unofficial translation. NIS operates the country's only oil refinery.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week sanctioned Alexandre de Moraes, a Brazilian Supreme Federal Court judge that it said has ordered "arbitrary pre-trial detentions" and suppressed freedom of expression.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned more than 115 people, entities and vessels for their ties to Iran, including for their part in a “vast shipping empire” controlled by Mohammad Hossein Shamkhani, the son of a top political adviser to the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ali Shamkhani. The designations -- which target a network generating tens of billions of dollars for Iran by moving oil and petroleum products from Iran and Russia to buyers around the world -- represent the U.S.'s largest Iran-related sanctions action since 2018, OFAC said.
Senate Foreign Relations Committee ranking member Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., asked the Trump administration July 30 to provide more information about its decision to allow Nvidia to sell H20 AI chips to China, including what “guardrails” it has put in place to ensure that the exports don’t help modernize the Chinese military.
The Bureau of Industry and Security fined an industrial equipment supplier more than $1.57 million after the agency said it illegally exported refiner plates to Russia. The company, Pennsylvania-based Andritz Inc., committed 36 violations of the Export Administration Regulations by shipping more than $3.1 million worth of the plates without a license between May 2023 and February 2024, BIS said.
Guernsey, a self-governing British Crown dependency in the English Channel, announced fines of 175,000 pounds (about $230,000) and 35,000 pounds (about $45,000) against a company and its director, respectively, for Russia-related sanctions violations. The Guernsey Financial Services Commission said ITI Trade and Alex Phil, its director, committed “wide-spread and systemic breaches” of sanctions regulatory requirements related to its Russian clients and “failed to ensure appropriate and effective” procedures against money laundering and financing terrorism.
House Foreign Affairs Committee ranking member Gregory Meeks, D-N.Y., said July 28 on social media that he’s “alarmed” that the Trump administration is lifting sanctions on “key people linked to Burma’s military regime,” referring to the country now known as Myanmar.
Rep. Morgan Luttrell, R-Texas, introduced a bill July 25 that would prohibit exports of medicine and prosthetic medical devices, such as artificial limbs, to Russia. The ban would stay in place until the State Department certifies to Congress that Russia has ended its military operations in Ukraine and withdrawn its forces. The Medical Supply Sanctions Act was referred to the House Foreign Affairs Committee.