The Office of Foreign Assets Control delayed the retirement of its “PIP, DEL, and SDALL.ZIP sanctions list file formats” until on or about Sept. 18, the agency said in a notice this week. OFAC was scheduled to retire the formats this month (see 2307070012). The notice includes a complete list of files that the agency will retire. The Sanctions List Search tool “will not be affected by these changes."
OFAC sanction activity
The U.S. removed sanctions from two former board members of a Russian state-owned bank after both argued they didn’t meet the criteria for placement on the Treasury Department’s Specially Designated Nationals List. The sanctions removals, made by the Office of Foreign Assets Control late last month, came after Russian nationals Elena Titova and Andrey Golikov, in separate complaints, sued the U.S. government over their designations, accusing it of sanctioning them on “no factual basis” and “unnecessarily” delaying delisting decisions.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control last week issued a new set of Russia sanctions, designating four members of Russia’s “financial elite” and a Russian business association. The sanctions target Petr Olegovich Aven, Mikhail Maratovich Fridman, German Borisovich Khan and Alexey Viktorovich Kuzmichev, along with the Russian Association of Employers the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP), a Russian technology industry organization.
After the administration reported on its strategy to disrupt narcotics trafficking linked to the Syrian regime, including its sanctions against Samer Kamal al-Assad and Khalid Qaddour, a key drug producer and facilitator, respectively, of captagon production in Syria, two members of the House of Representatives introduced a bill directing the administration to impose sanctions on more Syrian players in the production and sale of the amphetamine-like stimulant.
The U.S., the U.K. and Canada this week sanctioned the former governor of Lebanon’s central bank, Riad Salameh, and others involved in an international corruption scheme. The Treasury Department said Salameh “abused his position of power,” to “enrich himself and his associates” by funneling hundreds of millions of dollars through shell companies to invest in European real estate.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week sanctioned three Sinaloa Cartel members involved in illegally trafficking fentanyl and other “deadly drugs.” The designations target brothers Alfonso Arzate Garcia and Rene Arzate Garcia, both Baja California, Mexico-based cartel leaders. OFAC also sanctioned Rafael Guadalupe Felix Nunez, a “violent” cartel leader in Manzanillo, Mexico. The agency also published a Sinaloa Cartel "operations chart."
The U.S. this week announced a new set of sanctions against Belarus, targeting eight people, five entities and one aircraft with ties to President Alexander Lukashenko's regime. The designations target people and entities that have helped the government evade sanctions or are involved in the government’s “continued civil society repression” or its “complicity” in Russia’s war against Ukraine. The Office of Foreign Assets Control issued two new general licenses to authorize certain transactions with two of the newly sanctioned entities.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week issued new guidance to help companies, financial institutions, nongovernmental organizations and others understand what humanitarian activities are permitted under its Syria sanctions regulations. The seven-page guidance includes frequently asked questions OFAC said it has been receiving, covering topics related to caps on aid, crowdfunding, providing aid to areas controlled by the Syrian government, processing financial transactions, sending money to people in Syria, digital payment platforms, and exporting food, medicine and other goods to the country. It also stresses that OFAC’s authorizations allow transactions only where aid will benefit the Syrian people and not the government.
The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed a case against a United Arab Emirates cigarette filter and tear tape manufacturer following a more than $660,000 settlement agreement with the government for violating U.S. sanctions against North Korea . Essentra FZE Company Limited exported cigarette filter rods to North Korea and did not voluntarily disclose the violations, which the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control said constituted an egregious case (U.S. v. Essentra FZE Company, Dist. D.C. # 20-112).
The Office of Foreign Assets Control issued a final rule replacing its Mali Sanctions Regulations, which the agency had published in “abbreviated form” in 2020. The amended regulations, effective Aug. 7, implement a 2019 executive order that authorized sanctions against people and entities involved in human rights abuses and other sanctionable activities in the country. OFAC said it’s providing “a more comprehensive set of regulations, including additional interpretive and definitional guidance, general licenses, and other regulatory provisions.”