Export Compliance Daily is providing readers with the top stories from last week in case you missed them. You can find any article by searching for the title or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
Exports to China
The European Commission is cutting planned countervailing duties on Tesla vehicles imported from China by more than 10% and slightly lowering CVD on other EVs made by Chinese companies, it announced in draft definitive findings released Aug. 20.
Senior officials from the Treasury Department, the People’s Bank of China and others convened in Shanghai last week for the fifth meeting of the U.S.-China Financial Working Group, where they discussed beneficial ownership information, anti-money laundering efforts -- including updates on potential revisions of China’s AML law -- "and other topics," Treasury said Aug. 19. Biden administration officials "also raised areas of disagreement during the conversations," Treasury said. The meeting also included a roundtable with private Chinese and U.S. firms " to exchange views on a range of topics related to climate financing, including transition planning and carbon markets."
Chinese semiconductor equipment maker Advanced Micro-Fabrication Equipment (AMEC) sued the Pentagon last week for wrongly designating the firm as a Chinese military company. AMEC claimed that its designation violates the Administrative Procedure Act, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021 and the U.S. Constitution (Advanced Micro-Fabrication Equipment v. United States, D.D.C. # 24-02357).
Data recently published by S&P Global shows which countries are supplying Russia with computer numerically controlled machine tools and components, which the U.S. and its allies have identified as a “common high priority” good that Russia is seeking to buy to support its military in violation of Western export controls and sanctions.
Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., plans this year to make another attempt to persuade Congress to pass legislation aimed at boosting U.S. exports to Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, a spokesperson for the senator said Aug. 16.
Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., urged the Biden administration Aug. 16 to impose more sanctions on Venezuelan ruler Nicolas Maduro and his regime for refusing to concede he lost the country’s recent presidential election to opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez.
The Bureau of Industry and Security this week fined a Pennsylvania electronics business and its Hong Kong affiliate $5.8 million after the company voluntarily disclosed and admitted to illegally shipping controlled technology to China, including to military research institutes on the Entity List. The company, TE Connectivity Corporation, had “knowledge or reason to know” that the shipments violated U.S. export controls, BIS said, adding that its employees in China hid the true end-users and bypassed the company’s denied-party screening process.
The U.N. Security Council, which oversees various U.N. sanctions regimes, needs permanent representation from African countries, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres told the council in remarks this week. “We cannot accept that the world’s pre-eminent peace and security body lacks a permanent voice for a continent of well over a billion people,” Guterres said. Although Africa is “under-represented in global governance structures,” it’s “over-represented in the very challenges these structures are designed to address. Conflicts, emergencies and geopolitical divisions have an outsized impact on African countries.” He added: “The message is clear. There can be no global security without African security.”
China soon will impose new export controls on a set of key critical minerals, including antimony, and technology used to process those minerals, the country’s commerce ministry said Aug. 15, according to an unofficial translation. Antimony can be used in the production of certain batteries, weapons and more. The minerals and technology “have a significant impact on national security,” China said, and exports will need a license before they can be shipped abroad. The controls take effect Sept. 15.