The EU's customs exemptions for low-value shipments may encourage undervaluation, the European Court of Auditors said in a report on the EU's collection of customs duties for e-commerce imports. Customs duties aren't levied on imports of goods equal to or less than €150. "These low value consignment reliefs (LVCR) can be abused via: (i) undervaluation of goods, which are declared below the thresholds for the VAT and/or customs exemptions; (ii) splitting consignments to be under the threshold limit; (iii) importing of either commercial consignments declared as gifts or of goods which are ineligible for the relief," the auditors said.

Export Compliance Daily is providing readers with some of the top stories for July 8-12 in case they were missed.

Bipartisan members of the Senate and House introduced a bill on July 16 that would prevent the Trump administration from removing Huawei from Commerce’s Entity List without congressional approval. The bill would also give Congress oversight of Huawei-related export licenses granted by Commerce, allowing Congress to issue a “joint resolution of disapproval” to render any export license inactive.

Global export controls and international sanctions are not stopping luxury goods from entering North Korea, which is employing a significantly larger smuggling scheme than previously known, according to a July 16 report from the Center for Advanced Defense Studies (CADS), a nonprofit research organization in Washington. The 56-page report details how North Korea works with intermediaries, freight forwarders, private financiers and others to smuggle luxury goods into the country. The report also places North Korea’s smuggling system into context: Between 2015 and 2017, at least 90 countries “served as luxury goods procurement sources” for North Korea, the report said.

The U.S. has not yet delivered the $8 billion in emergency arms sales to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates it announced on May 24, a State Department official told a Senate committee, causing both Republican and Democratic senators to question why the sales justified an emergency.

Britain is offering to release Grace 1, the seized Iranian oil tanker, if Iran can provide proof the ship is not transporting oil to Syria, United Kingdom Foreign Minister Jeremy Hunt said July 13. The ship was originally seized by Gibraltar Port and Law Enforcement on July 4 after British authorities suspected it of shipping oil to Syria, which would have violated European Union sanctions (see 1907080022). The ship was seized in Gibraltar territorial waters.

China plans to impose sanctions on U.S. companies that sell defense products to Taiwan, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang said July 12.

A group of U.S. venture capital funds is suing the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, alleging that OFAC’s 50 percent rule is unconstitutional, court records show. The lawsuit says the rule -- which bans companies and people from dealing with entities owned 50 percent or more by a sanctioned party -- unlawfully prevented the plaintiffs from accessing their money, property and investments, violating unreasonable seizure and due process laws under the Fourth and Fifth amendments to the Constitution, respectively.

Plans to reorganize International Traffic in Arms Regulations are ongoing despite what has been a lengthy legal review of the draft rules, a Directorate of Defense Trade Controls official said while speaking July 9 at the Bureau of Industry and Security annual export controls conference. Through a "series of rules we are trying to make the content of the ITAR more linear and more discernable," said Rob Hart, regulatory and multilateral affairs division chief in the Office of Defense Trade Controls Policy.

The Commerce Department is planning to release its upcoming advance notice of proposed rulemaking on foundational technologies before it issues its proposed rules on emerging technologies, said Hillary Hess, director of Commerce’s regulatory policy division in the Bureau of Industry and Security, at BIS's annual export controls conference on July 10.