Export Compliance Daily is providing readers with some of the top stories for Sept. 30 - Oct. 4 in case they were missed.
U.S. sanctions on two large shipping companies last month disrupted the tanker market, forcing oil traders to cancel bookings and causing rates to spike as they searched for other ships, according to a September post from Clyde & Co.
A U.S. manufacturing company disclosed it may have violated U.S. sanctions on Iran, in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company, H.B. Fuller, said it voluntarily disclosed the possible violations to the Treasury Department in September 2018 after discovering its subsidiaries in Turkey and India may have sold its products to customers who then resold them to Iran. The possible violations began in Turkey in 2011 and in India in 2014, the company’s Sept. 27 filing said, and involved the resale of “hygiene products.”
The United Kingdom must improve its outreach and guidance to the private sector to make sure its post-Brexit sanctions regime is effective, a task force organized by the Royal United Services Institute said in a September report. The task force, composed of former U.K. sanctions officials, policy experts and private sector representatives, said Britain should review and increase staffing within its sanctions regimes and consider adopting some of the sanctions guidance tools provided by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, RUSI said.
Sigal Mandelker, the Treasury’s undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, is resigning to return to the private sector, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Oct. 2. In a statement. Mnuchin called Mandelker a “fierce advocate for effectively leveraging our powerful economic tools to make an impact for a safer world,” according to Reuters. Mnuchin said Mandelker made the decision to resign over the summer.
The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control announced a $2.7 million settlement with Boston-based General Electric for 289 violations of the Cuban Assets Control Regulations by three of GE’s current or former subsidiaries, OFAC said in an Oct. 1 notice. The subsidiaries -- Getsco Technical Services Inc., Bentley Nevada, and GE Betz -- accepted payments from The Cobalt Refinery Company, a U.S.-sanctioned company, “for goods and services provided to a Canadian customer” between 2010 and 2014, OFAC said.
Export Compliance Daily is providing readers with some of the top stories for Sept. 23-27 in case they were missed.
The Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control updated two Venezuelan general licenses related to dealings with certain bonds and securities, OFAC said in a Sept. 30 notice. General License No. 3F is replaced with General License No. 3G, which authorizes dealings with certain Venezuela-related bonds until March 31, 2020. General License No. 9E is replaced with General License No. 9F, which authorizes certain dealings related to Petroleos de Venezuela securities, also until March 31, 2020.
The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned Russian people, entities and other actors for trying to influence the 2018 U.S. midterm elections, Treasury said in a Sept. 30 press release. The sanctions also increase pressure on Yevgeniy Prigozhin, a previously designated Russian businessman, by sanctioning three of his planes, a yacht and employees of the Internet Research Agency (IRA), which Prigozhin funds, Treasury said.
Former National Security Adviser John Bolton said U.S. sanctions are not being enforced effectively and criticized what he said is a lack of U.S. involvement in the Japan-South Korea trade dispute.