OFAC to Dissolve Agreement Blocking Russian Nonproliferation Goods

The Office of Foreign Assets Control on March 29 will end the Highly Enriched Uranium (HEU) Agreement, which blocked Russian government property related to disposition of HEU extracted from nuclear weapons, OFAC said (here). The agency took the action because the national emergency on which the regulations were based has been canceled, it said. President Barack Obama on May 26 terminated a 2012 renewal of a 2000 executive order that activated the national emergency, which stated that Russia’s possession of a “large volume” of weapons-usable fissile material threatened U.S. national security and foreign policy. The HEU Agreements had been implemented successfully, allowing the discontinuation, OFAC said.