Shuren Qin, a Chinese national living in Wellesley, Massachusetts, pleaded guilty to illegally causing the export of more than $100,000 worth of U.S.-origin goods to Chinese military university Northwestern Polytechnical University, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts announced in an April 28 news release. Qin pleaded guilty to a litany of charges including conspiracy to unlawfully export items without an export license, visa fraud, money laundering and smuggling hydrophones from the U.S. to China, the Justice Department said. The illegally exported goods consisted of technology with underwater and marine applications to allegedly be used for NWPU's development of unmanned aerial vehicles, autonomous underwater vehicles and missile proliferation projects, Justice said. To import the goods, Qin created LinkOcean Technologies, subsequently sending the goods to China from the U.S., Canada and Europe.
Country of origin cases
Diamond sawblades made by Protech in Canada from a core and segments each of Chinese and non-Chinese origin are not subject to antidumping duties on diamond sawblades from China (A-570-900), but some are covered by duties nonetheless due to Protech’s partial ineligibility for making the required certifications, the Commerce Department said in a scope ruling issued April 27.
A newly issued CBP ruling further clarifies how the agency determines country of origin for electric motors. After having recently found that the stator and the rotor are the “most essential components” of an electric motor and, under a substantial transformation analysis, determine the country of origin (see 2104210041), the agency on April 22 issued another ruling that considered motors where the rotor and stator were made in different countries, and found the stator assembly controlling.
Five aluminum extrusion importers evaded antidumping and countervailing duties on goods from China by commingling shipments in the Dominican Republic, CBP said in a Jan. 28 determination notice posted by the agency April 27. The finding is a result of an investigation that began following a 2019 allegation from the Aluminum Extrusions Fair Trade Committee (AEFTC) that the companies were evading AD/CV orders A-570-967 and C-570-968. The importers are Florida Aluminum Extrusion, Classic Metals Supplies, Global Aluminum Inc., H&E Home, Industrias Feliciano Aluminum Inc. JL Trading Corp. and Puertas y Ventanas J.M., Inc.
Aluminum extrusion importer Global Aluminum Distributor filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Enforce and Protect A investigations, becoming the latest to challenge the process for countering antidumping duty evasion. In an April 28 complaint, Global Aluminum said CBP's EAPA process violated procedural requirements and the importer's constitutional rights related to due process and excessive fines, and that CBP is unfairly subjecting a company to two EAPA investigations for the same conduct and entries. Separate from other EAPA complaints, Global Aluminum claims that the duties assessed via the evasion finding constitutes a violation of the Eight Amendment for excessive fines.
Petitioners in an antidumping duty investigation of seamless carbon and alloy steel standard, line, and pressure pipe from Ukraine recently filed briefs opposing a Ukrainian exporter’s proposal to negotiate a suspension agreement in the ongoing investigation. Tenaris USA, a domestic manufacturer that supports the petition, says a suspension agreement proposed by Interpipe “will not be effective, and that an antidumping duty order would better discipline Interpipe’s dumping of SSLPP in the United States,” in a filing April 27 with the Commerce Department.
The following are short summaries of recent CBP “NY” rulings issued by the agency's National Commodity Specialist Division in New York:
Steel importer Norca Industrial Company filed a challenge to an affirmative Enforce and Protect Act determination, claiming that CBP did not have a legal basis to initiate the investigation and violated its due process rights. In an April 27 complaint in the Court of International Trade, Norca made six claims against its EAPA investigation, including on the constitutionality of the process and whether CBP unfairly made adverse inferences against the company to determine that evasion took place (Norca Industrial Company LLC v. U.S., CIT # 21-00192).
The scope of antidumping and countervailing duty orders cannot be expanded to include goods that were not part of the International Trade Commission's original injury determination, Thai steel exporter Saha Thai Steel Pipe Public Company argued in an April 27 reply brief to the Court of International Trade. Citing, among other things, the fact that the ITC's final injury determination did not cover tariff subheadings for dual-stenciled pipe, Saha seeks to overturn the Commerce Department's final scope ruling that dual-stenciled pipe is subject to antidumping duties on circular welded carbon steel pipes and tubes from Thailand (Saha Thai Steel Pipe Public Company Limited v. U.S., CIT #20-00133). Saha says the trade court is bound by the precedent of a 1998 Federal Circuit decision involving Wheatland Tube.
The Customs Rulings Online Search System (CROSS) was updated April 27 with the following headquarters rulings (ruling revocations and modifications will be detailed elsewhere in a separate article as they are announced in the Customs Bulletin):