Sanctions

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The United States has announced additional financial sanctions on three individuals and nine entities supporting Russia’s attempt to integrate the Crimea region of Ukraine through private investment and privatization projects or engaging in serious human rights abuses in furtherance of Russia’s occupation or control over parts of Ukraine. Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism…

In early August 2018, after it was determined that the Russian government was involved in an attempt to assassinate UK citizen Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia Skripal with the use of a Novichok nerve agent, the U.S. Department of State (State Department) ruled under the Chemical and Biological Weapons Control and Warfare Elimination Act of 1991 that the Russian government had used chemical or biological weapons in violation of international law. In an August 27, 2018 Federal Register notice, the U.S. government announced its sanctions in response, which became effective that date:

  • Foreign Assistance: Termination of assistance to Russia under the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, except for urgent humanitarian assistance and food or other agricultural commodities or products.
  • Termination of Arms Sales: Termination of (a) sales to Russia under the Arms Export Control Act of any defense articles, defense services or design and construction services; and (b) licenses for the export to Russia of any item on the United States Munitions List.
  • Termination of Arms Sales Financing: Termination of all foreign military financing for Russia under the Arms Export Control Act.
  • Denial of U.S. Government Credit or Other Financial Assistance: Denial to Russia of any credit, credit guarantees, or other financial assistance by any department, agency or instrumentality of the U.S. government, including the Export-Import Bank of the United States.
  • Exports of National Security-Sensitive Goods and Technology: Prohibition on the export to Russia of any goods or technology on that part of the control list established under Section 2404(c)(1) of the Appendix to Title 50.

In connection with President Donald Trump’s May 8, 2018 decision to cease U.S. participation in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and to re-impose all sanctions lifted or waived in connection with the JCPOA, the president has issued a new Iran-related Executive Order, “Reimposing Certain Sanctions With Respect to Iran.” This completes the first of two wind-down periods for the re-imposition of certain Iranian sanctions. The terms in the Executive Order are effective at 12:01 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) on August 7, 2018. In addition, certain wind-down general licenses that allowed limited continued actions involving Iran will expire at 11:59 p.m. EDT on August 6, 2018.

As reported in a Trump and Trade Update dated June 8, 2018, the Department of Commerce reached a superseding settlement agreement with Zhongxing Telecommunications Equipment Corporation of Shenzhen, China (ZTE Corporation) and ZTE Kangxun Telecommunications Ltd. of Hi-New Shenzhen, China (ZTE Kangxun) (collectively, ZTE) to remove the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) denial order imposed as a result of ZTE’s violations of its March 2017 settlement agreement. BIS has now published the superseding settlement agreement.

President Donald Trump and Chairman Kim Jong Un issued a joint statement at the conclusion of their summit in Singapore in which both countries committed to further negotiations and future cooperation for the development of new relations between the United States and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. In the statement, Trump committed “to provide…

On June 7, 2018, the U.S. Department of Commerce announced that Zhongxing Telecommunications Equipment Corporation of Shenzhen, China (ZTE Corporation) and ZTE Kangxun Telecommunications Ltd. of Hi-New Shenzhen, China (ZTE Kangxun) (collectively, ZTE) had agreed to additional penalties and compliance measures to replace Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) denial order imposed as a result of ZTE’s violations of its March 2017 settlement agreement. On April 15, 2018, BIS activated the suspended denial order against ZTE after learning that ZTE had not disciplined numerous employees responsible for the violations that led to the settlement agreement. Instead, ZTE rewarded those employees with bonuses. With the imposition of the denial order by BIS, ZTE announced in early May 2018 that all major operating activities of the company had ceased as a result of the denial order. On May 13, 2018, President Trump, against the advice of U.S. law enforcement and intelligence officials, announced that “President Xi of China, and I, are working together to give massive Chinese phone company, ZTE, a way to get back into business, fast. Too many jobs in China lost. Commerce Department has been instructed to get it done!”

In response to the United States’ withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA, also informally known as the Iran nuclear deal) on May 8, 2018, the European Union (EU) has announced that it will take several actions in an effort to continue the full implementation of the JCPOA and to protect EU businesses.…

President Trump has announced that the United States will withdraw from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA, also informally known as the Iran nuclear deal) that was entered into in 2015 by Iran, the United States, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United Kingdom. The JCPOA was negotiated in an effort to ensure that Iran’s nuclear program would be used exclusively for non-military, peaceful means. On January 16, 2016, the JCPOA was formally implemented and certain trade and economic sanctions against Iran were relaxed by the other parties to the deal. From its inception, the Iran nuclear deal has had its share of proponents and critics, and was a hot-button issue during the 2016 presidential election. During the campaign, and since, President Trump repeatedly stated that the deal was “one of the worst and most one-sided transactions the United States has ever entered into.” In making today’s announcement, President Trump stated that the JCPOA was “defective at its core” since it would not prevent Iran from ultimately developing a nuclear bomb. He argued that the sunset provisions of the deal and the onsite inspection provisions were clearly inadequate, and at the time when the United States had “maximum leverage,” it entered into a deal that gave Iran, a “leading state sponsor of terrorism,” billions of dollars. The president called the agreement “a great embarrassment to me as a citizen and all citizens of the United States.”

The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), in consultation with the Department of State, has sanctioned numerous Russian oligarchs and the companies they own or control, 17 senior Russian government officials, and a state-owned Russian weapons trading company. In his announcement, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin stated, “The Russian government engages…