The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security issued a guidance for exports, re-exports and transfers to Pakistan, covering license requirements for items subject to the Export Administration Regulations and best practices for screening Pakistani customers.
A Bureau of Industry and Security official acknowledged a delay in the agency’s proposed rulemaking for foundational technologies, saying she and other top Commerce Department officials expected the notice to be published by now. “I personally thought foundational would be out faster than it is. It was not just higher-level people,” said Hillary Hess, BIS’s director of the regulatory policy division, speaking during a Sept. 3 panel hosted by the American Bar Association.
Nazak Nikakhtar is no longer the acting Commerce Department undersecretary for industry and security, a position she held as she awaited confirmation from the Senate, a Commerce spokesperson said. Nikakhtar is no longer performing that duty and is now focused solely on her role as assistant secretary for industry and analysis. Her nomination has not yet been officially withdrawn.
Commerce's Bureau of Industry and Security issued a guidance on Aug. 20 about the disclosure of technology or software subject to export controls “between and among members of standards setting or development groups or bodies.” BIS said it issued the guidance after receiving “a number of questions” about the temporary general license for Huawei and the Chinese company’s addition to the Entity List. The guidance tries to clarify which activities are prohibited among standards organizations when discussing Huawei and its Entity Listing.
Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security revoked export privileges for four people after they exported guns, ammunition and other defense-related items from the U.S. to Lebanon, BIS said Aug. 13. The four people -- Ali Afif Al Herz, Sarah Majid Zeaiter, Adam Al Herz and Bassem Afif Herz -- were convicted in 2016 of violating the Arms Export Control Act by exporting items on the U.S. Munitions List without State Department licenses. Each was sentenced to prison and placed on the State Department’s Debarred List.
Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security on Aug. 19 renewed the temporary general license for Huawei and added 46 more of the company’s non-U.S. affiliates to the Entity List, bringing the total number of impacted Huawei affiliates to more than 100.
The Bureau of Industry and Security renewed the temporary general license for Huawei and added 46 more of Huawei’s non-U.S. affiliates to the Entity List. The changes, which take effect Aug. 19, extend the general license’s expiration date from Aug. 19 to Nov. 18 and make several other technical changes to entries on the Entity List, including adding new aliases and addresses.
Future Commerce Department export controls on artificial intelligence could end up blunting AI technology development in the U.S., according to an Aug. 8 post from Lowenstein Sandler.
One of the top concerns of the U.S. firearms industry is the delay in transitioning export controls of firearms and ammunition from the State Department to the Commerce Department, said Larry Keane, senior vice president of the National Shooting Sports Foundation. As the wait for Export Control Reform has increased -- beginning in 2009 under the Obama administration and continuing under the Trump administration -- the U.S. firearms industry increasingly feels as if it has been left behind, Keane said.
The Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security is seeking comments on the impact that proposed additions to the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) will have on U.S. industries and commerce, according to a notice in the Federal Register. BIS is seeking comments about the additions to Schedule 1 in the “Annex on Chemicals” in the CWC that were implemented through the Chemical Weapons Convention Implementation Act and the Chemical Weapons Convention Regulations. BIS said it wants to assess the impact on U.S. chemical, biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies of the five “chemical families” being added to the annex. Comments are due Sept. 13.