The Office of Foreign Assets Control last week sanctioned several senior Venezuelan officials helping Nicolas Maduro keep control of the country, including Hector Andres Obregon Perez, president of major state-owned oil firm Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A. Others designated include Venezuela’s transportation minister, its lead “legal security” official and several military and police leaders. The designations come after the Maduro regime appeared to alter the results of the country’s presidential elections last year, drawing criticism from the U.S. and others (see 2407290044).
The U.S. announced a host of new sanctions against Russia’s energy sector last week, targeting major Russian oil producers, oil service providers and insurance companies, as well as vessels and traders moving Russian oil as part of the country’s shadow fleet. The Office of Foreign Assets Control also issued two new determinations that authorize sanctions against any person or entity with ties to Russia’s energy sector and that block the provision of U.S. petroleum services to parties in Russia, and it announced it will soon be ending a general license that had authorized certain Russia-related energy payments.
Lawmakers this week reintroduced two Venezuela sanctions bills as the new 119th Congress gears up for business.
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.
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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.
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 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.