The latest on Russia sanctions from the International Trade and Supply Chain Team
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The U.S. Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) issued General License 8G (“GL 8G”), which authorizes five (5) U.S. oil and gas companies to engage in transactions “ordinarily incident and necessary to the limited maintenance of essential operations, contracts or other agreements”, as well as transactions necessary to the wind down of operations in Venezuela involving Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A. (“PdVSA”) or any entity which PdVSA owns a 50% or greater interest and that were in effect prior to July 26, 2019.  Effective November 17, 2020, GL 8G replaces and supersedes GL 8F which was set to expire on December 1, 2020, effectively extending its deadline through 12:01 eastern daylight time on June 3, 2021.  GL 8G applies specifically to the following entities and their subsidiaries: Chevron Corporation, Halliburton, Schlumberger Ltd., Baker Hughes (a GE company), and Weatherford International, PLC.
Continue Reading OFAC Issues Venezuela General License 8G Extending Authorization of Certain Transactions for U.S. Oil & Gas Companies

The U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (“BIS”) issued a final rule effective October 29, 2020 amending Section 742.4(b)(7) of the Export Administration Regulations (“EAR”) to revise
Continue Reading BIS Amends License Review Policy for National Security Controlled Items Destined for China, Venezuela, and Russia

The U.S. Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) recently issued General License 13E (“GL 13E”), authorizing certain activities involving Nynas AB, a Swedish manufacturer of specialty oils
Continue Reading OFAC Extends General License for Companies Doing Business with PDVSA Affiliate Nynas AB

Venezuela recently  initiated a World Trade Organization (“WTO”)  complaint against U.S. sanctions, claiming that the United States has “imposed certain coercive trade-restrictive measures on the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela
Continue Reading Venezuela Files Complaint Challenging U.S. Sanctions at the WTO

Today, January 8, 2019, the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) added approximately 30 individuals and entities to its Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List (the “SDN List”) due to their engagement in corrupt currency exchange transactions which enriched themselves by at least $2.4 billion at the expense of Venezuela’s citizens.  These sanctioned persons include two former Venezuelan National Treasurers – Claudia Patricia Diaz Guillen (“Diaz”) and Alejandro Jose Andrade Cedeno (“Andrade”) – who authorized a Venezuelan businessman named Raul Antonio Gorrin Belisario (“Gorrin”) to convert Venezuelan bolivars into U.S. dollars at highly favorable exchange rates at currency exchange houses under his control.  Gorrin then shared the resulting excess currency conversion profits with Diaz and Andrade by engaging in deceptive practices to purchase a wide variety of properties, aircraft and other luxury assets on behalf of Diaz, Andrade, their family members and their other business associates.  The Treasury Department published a diagram which explains the scheme in further detail.
Continue Reading OFAC Announces New Sanctions Related to Venezuela

The Department of Commerce released its reports recommending remedies with respect to the Section 232 investigations of steel and aluminum today, February 16. The steel report was submitted to the White House on January 11, 2018 and started a statutory 90-day clock for the President to make a decision on a course of action. The aluminum report was submitted on January 19, 2018 and similarly started the statutory 90 days for the decision.
Continue Reading Commerce Releases Steel and Aluminum Section 232 Reports