The European Union General Court annulled the 2020 sanctions listings of three former Ukrainian officials. The separate July 7 judgments were for the former Prime Minister Sergej Arbuzov, former Prosecutor General Viktor Pshonka and Pshonka's son Artem Pshonka, a former parliament member, according to unofficial translations. The court said the EU Council hadn't proved that Ukrainian authorities respected the individuals' right to effective judicial protection during the criminal proceedings on which the council relied. The Pshonkas were relisted by the council on March 5 and remain subject to EU sanctions, according to two implementing decisions.
The United Kingdom Foreign Affairs Committee issued a list of recommendations for how to respond to human rights violations in China's Xinjiang region in a July 8 report, “Never Again: The UK's Responsibility to Act on Atrocities in Xinjiang and Beyond.” The report looks at the multilateral system, diaspora and culture, forced labor and the private sector, technology and research, and the U.K.'s approach to atrocity prevention. Recommendations include coordinating sanctions with allies, introducing legal obligations to remove forced labor from business supply chains partnered with sanctions for noncompliance, banning U.K. entities from conducting business with Chinese companies associated with the Xinjiang atrocities, and providing access to sanctions experts for all government departments.
Torres Law issued a July 3 guide on the common company changes that require notifications to the State Department’s Director of Defense Trade Controls to comply with International Traffic in Arms Regulations’ registration requirements. The guide provides a checklist companies can review when they are undergoing a “material change” covered under the ITAR, including preparing a material change notification letter and updating information in the Defense Export Control Compliance System.
The Bureau of Industry and Security added 34 entities under 43 entries to Entity List, BIS said in a final rule. Fourteen of those entities are based in China and “have enabled Beijing’s campaign of repression, mass detention, and high-technology surveillance against Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and members of other Muslim minority groups in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Regions of China (XUAR), where the PRC continues to commit genocide and crimes against humanity,” the Commerce Department said in a news release. Another five of the entities were “directly supporting PRC’s military modernization programs related to lasers and C4ISR programs, Commerce said.
The United Kingdom's Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation removed Agat System from its Belarus sanctions regime, in a July 8 notice. Agat Electromechanical Plant JSC is part of the Belarusian State Authority for Military Industry, tasked with the “military-technical policy of the state,” and will no longer be subject to an asset freeze.
The United Kingdom's Export Control Joint Unit, part of the Department for International Trade, on July 8 released guidance on export licensing decisions made Oct. 1 to Dec. 31, 2020. The data includes quarterly reports on issued licenses, previous quarterly licensing data reports, annual licensing data reports for 2008-2020 and guidance on strategic export controls data.
The United Kingdom's Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation removed an entry from its Syrian sanctions regime, dropping "leading businessperson in Syria" Nader Qalei from the sanctions list, in a July 8 notice. Qalei will no longer be subject to an asset freeze.
The U.S. extended national emergencies authorizing sanctions against Hong Kong and transnational criminal organizations, the White House said July 7. The White House said actions taken by Beijing to “fundamentally undermine” Hong Kong’s autonomy and activities by transnational criminal groups continue to “pose an unusual and extraordinary threat” to U.S. national security and foreign policy. The emergencies were renewed for one year, from July 14 and July 24, 2021, respectively.
China’s recently passed foreign sanctions law gives it broad discretion to penalize companies for obeying U.S. and other countries' restrictions against China, although it remains unclear how China will use the new tools and what specific activities will be targeted, law firms said. Even so, businesses operating in China should closely review the new law, which passed the National People’s Congress in June (see 2106150030) and closely mirrors U.S. regulations. “It creates a menu of countersanctions available to Chinese authorities” that are “taken straight from the U.S. sanctions playbook,” Morrison & Foerster said in a June 30 post.
The Washington lobbying firm that represents a Chinese surveillance company recently hired a former U.S. sanctions officer to advise it on U.S. sanctions weeks after the Chinese company was added to a U.S. blacklist, Axios reported July 7. The firm, Mercury Public Affairs, which lobbies on behalf of Hikvision, last month hired Peter Kucik as managing director of its D.C. office, it said in a press release. Kucik was formerly a senior sanctions policy adviser at the Office of Foreign Assets Control. Hikvision was designated a Chinese military company and added to an investment ban list last year (see 2011130026). Hikvision declined to comment, and Mercury didn’t comment.