President Joe Biden on Jan. 8 amended the scope of a 2021 executive order that authorizes certain sanctions against people and entities threatening the sovereignty of the Western Balkans or that are engaging in corruption in the region. The order includes new language that authorizes sanctions against any “leader, official, or member of an entity, including a government entity, that has engaged in, or attempted to engage in” the sanctionable activities outlined in the order. It also authorizes sanctions against the spouses or adult children of people sanctioned under the order.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week sanctioned Antal Rogan, a senior Hungarian government official, for corruptly diverting money from the country’s “strategic” sectors for himself and his loyalists. OFAC said Rogan, who is in charge of the government’s National Communications Office, Digital Government Agency, the Hungarian Tourism Agency and others, has “used his role to enrich himself and those loyal to his party,” including “distributing public contracts and resources to cronies.”

The U.S. this week sanctioned Mohammad Hamdan Daglo Mousa, commander of Sudan’s Rapid Support Forces, along with seven United Arab Emirates-based companies tied to the group, which has been locked in monthslong fighting with the country’s Sudanese Armed Forces. The State Department also issued a determination saying that the RSF has “perpetrated genocide” in the Darfur region of Sudan during the war, including through various human rights violations and crimes against defenseless civilians.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control on Jan. 7 renewed a Russia-related general license that authorizes certain transactions involving the Russian Federation's Central Bank, Wealth Fund and Ministry of Finance. General License No. 13L, which replaced 13K, now authorizes those transactions, including taxes, fees, or import duties, through 12:01 a.m. EDT April 9. The license was set to expire Jan. 8.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control on Jan. 6 issued a new license authorizing certain government, energy and personal remittance-related transactions with Syria. The license, General License No. 24, was issued about a month after the Dec. 8 collapse of the country’s Bashar al-Assad regime, which had faced strict financial sanctions.

Israel announced sanctions last week against an organization running a donation campaign that it said is crowdsourcing money to support the terror group Hezbollah. Israel’s Money Laundering and Terror Financing Prohibition Authority said the campaign has raised tens of thousands of dollars through donations from credit cards, bank transfers and PayPal. “The imposition of sanctions is another significant step in the economic struggle against Hezbollah and other terrorist organizations, with the aim of discouraging the public from participating in financing their activities,” the Israeli agency said, according to an unofficial translation. The notice didn’t name the organization.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control last week sanctioned Integrity Technology Group, Inc., a Beijing cybersecurity company that it said has been involved in multiple cyberattacks against U.S. people or companies.

The U.K. on Jan. 2 removed Abdelhafiz Zlitni from its Libya sanctions list. The U.K. had listed Zlitni as the minister for planning and finance of the Libyan government under Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control was one of multiple Treasury Department offices recently breached by Chinese government hackers, the Washington Post reported this week. Treasury reportedly disclosed the hack in a Dec. 30 letter to lawmakers, saying that it was still assessing the impact. The agency added that the documents accessed were unclassified and there was no evidence the hacker still has access to Treasury systems.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week sanctioned Russian Judge Olesya Mendeleeva for her involvement in the “arbitrary detention” of Moscow city councilor and human rights advocate Alexei Gorinov, who was sentenced to seven years in prison in 2022 for opposing Russia’s war against Ukraine. OFAC said Mendeleeva is known for giving “long and harsh sentences” and convicted Gorinov of “knowingly disseminating false information about the Russian military," the first judge in Russia to find a defendant guilty for such a charge.