The Bureau of Industry and Security is ending its work in the U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council as part of a broader effort to pull back from traditional export control dialogues with allies, Jeffrey Kessler, the head of BIS, said in a closed-door meeting with agency officials last week. Kessler also said the agency plans to significantly increase export enforcement against China, warned about possible staffing cuts, urged officials to tamp down on conversations with industry, and said it’s unclear whether existing export controls against Russia will be maintained.
Technology companies and industry groups mostly supported a January State Department rule that will add items to the U.S. Munitions List and remove other items that no longer warrant control (see 2501160027), although they said new restrictions around autonomous underwater vehicles, radar-related technology and more could cause unintended consequences.
Longtime Bureau of Industry and Security officials Hillary Hess, Sheila Quarterman and Carlos Monroy soon will retire from the agency, multiple people familiar with the matter said.
The EU is growing increasingly concerned about Beijing's use of export controls and trade remedies as retaliatory tools against other nations, a senior European Commission official said this week.
The Bureau of Industry and Security corrected a date error in the savings clause of a final rule this week that added 12 entities to its Entity List (see 2503250075). The savings clause says that all exports that now require a license as a result of the rule but were aboard a carrier to a port as of March 25 may proceed to their destinations under the previous eligibility as long as they are exported by April 24. Any items not exported before midnight April 24 will require a license.
American allies, including the EU, should introduce their own versions of the U.S. foreign direct product rule and the October 2022 U.S. persons controls that restricted additional sensitive semiconductor exports (see 2212210059), the Center for Strategic and International Studies said in a new report.
The Bureau of Industry and Security is adding 82 entities, mostly in mainland China, to the Entity List, targeting technology companies, chip firms, electronics businesses and others for their ties to Chinese military end-users. The additions, the first since President Donald Trump took office in January, also target entities in Taiwan, Pakistan, the United Arab Emirates, South Africa and Iran for a range of reasons that BIS said are “contrary to the national security and foreign policy” of the U.S.
The U.S. is giving oil company Chevron more time to wind down certain oil activities in Venezuela that had been authorized by an Office of Foreign Assets Control general license, OFAC said March 24.
Companies moving export-controlled goods should generally require customers to fill out end-user and end-use statements for all transactions, even if the shipments are for less sensitive EAR99 items, Commerce Department officials said.
Senior Bureau of Industry and Security officials haven’t yet been given orders by the Trump administration on several key export control policy issues, including possible plans to soon relax export controls against Russia, multiple Commerce Department officials said last week.