China on Oct. 20 announced new export controls on certain graphite products, placing restrictions on a key material used to produce batteries for electric vehicles. The country's Ministry of Commerce will require companies to secure export licenses for high-purity, high-strength artificial graphite materials and their products, along with natural flake graphite and its products, according to an unofficial translation of a notice.
Katrin Kuhlmann, a visiting professor of law at Georgetown University, and Devi Ariyani, the executive director of the Indonesia Service Dialogue Council, both said they hope the World Trade Organization's moratorium on e-commerce duties is extended, during a Peterson Institute for International Economics event on Oct. 18. Although the moratorium has been regularly extended since 1998, a few countries are preparing to introduce tariffs on digitally transferred goods before the moratorium's expiration in March 2024, Cecilia Malmström, a nonresident senior fellow at PIIE, said at the event.
The European Parliament's Internal Market and International Trade committees adopted a draft regulation that would provide a framework for investigating the use of forced labor in global supply chains and bans all goods using forced labor, the parliament announced. If the investigation of a company reveals the use of forced labor, the European Parliament said, "all import and export of the related goods would be halted at the EU's borders and companies would also have to withdraw goods that have already reached the EU market." Goods that had reached the market would be "donated, recycled or destroyed."
Norway, one of the major suppliers of electric vehicle battery minerals to the U.S., hasn't gotten any encouragement from the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative when its representatives have asked to negotiate a critical minerals agreement.
The World Customs Organization's Harmonized System Committee will extend its customary five-year review cycle by an additional year, the WCO said in a press release on Oct. 12. This means that the next version of the Harmonized System will be implemented on Jan. 1, 2028.
The European Commission will not extend the legal framework that exempts liner shipping from EU antitrust rules, it said in an announcement Oct. 10. The commission said the antitrust rules, known as the Consortia Block Exemption Regulation (CBER), "no longer promotes competition in the shipping sector" and will expire on April 25, 2024.
The EU has received assurances that Beijing will grant export licenses for shipments of gallium and germanium to European businesses despite the restrictions China placed on exports of the two metals in August (see 2307050018), European Commission Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis said this week. Dombrovskis also said the bloc is looking to sanction additional Chinese firms that may be skirting restrictions against Russia and is hoping to ensure its upcoming supply chain due diligence regulations don’t impose excessive compliance burdens on EU companies.
Companies should review existing and prospective agreements for potential liability under China's anti-foreign sanctions law, Evan Chuck of Crowell & Moring advised during a Practising Law Institute webinar on Sept. 26.
China's Ministry of Commerce said the recent U.S. decision to add three Chinese entities to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List (see 2309260035) "has no factual basis and lacks transparency," according to an unofficial translation. Dubbing the move a "typical act of economic bullying," the ministry said the additions suppress Chinese firms and seriously distort the facts surrounding the situation in the Xinjiang region. It said there is no forced labor in Xinjiang, saying the additions were made solely in the name of undermining Xinjiang's prosperity and stability. "China will take all necessary measures to resolutely safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese enterprises," the ministry said.
On a panel on critical minerals ally-shoring, panelists representing the perspective of Latin America, the U.S., the EU and, to some degree, China, agreed that the current race to lock down supplies of the raw materials needed for advanced batteries, wind turbines and computer chips is one where every man is out for himself, and resource-rich countries in the Global South are exploited.