The Commerce Department was right to find that the material terms of exporter Toyo Kohan’s U.S. sales were finalized the earlier of each sale’s shipment date or invoice date, the government and petitioner Thomas Steel Strip Corp. each said July 11 (Toyo Kohan Co. v. United States, CIT # 24-00261).
James Treanor, former attorney-adviser in the Office of Foreign Assets Control's chief counsel's office, has joined Akin as a senior counsel, he announced on LinkedIn. Treanor will help clients with international trade and national security-related regulatory and enforcement issues, including those related to sanctions and export controls. He left OFAC in June.
An Iranian national and U.S. resident was arrested for allegedly exporting electronics used in railway signaling and telecommunications systems in violation of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations, DOJ announced last week. Bahram Ostovari is charged with one count of conspiring to violate the IEEPA and three counts of violating the IEEPA, facing a maximum prison sentence of 20 years for each count.
The following are short summaries of recent CBP NY rulings issued by the agency's National Commodity Specialist Division in New York:
The U.S. opposed exporter Camel Group's motion to unredact part of the record in the company's case against its placement on the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List, arguing on July 10 that disclosure of information deemed confidential "would substantially harm the Government's" law enforcement efforts in applying the UFLPA. The government told the Court of International Trade it has a "strong interest in protecting the law enforcement sensitive information," while Camel has "no compelling argument as to why disclosure to the public, or to Camel, as opposed to confidential disclosure, is necessary" (Camel Group Co. v. United States, CIT # 25-00022).
The Commerce Department showed its work in finding that exporter East Sea Seafoods is independent of the Vietnamese government and thus eligible for a separate rate under an antidumping duty order on Vietnamese catfish in the 2019-20 administrative review of the AD order, the Court of International Trade held on July 10. Judge M. Miller Baker also held that Commerce properly assigned exporter Green Farms Seafood Joint Stock Company an AD rate taken from a simple average of respondent NTSF Seafood's zero percent rate and East Sea's adverse facts available rate.
The Russian grantor of a blocked U.S.-based trust company is suing the Office of Foreign Assets Control, saying OFAC falsely accused the trust of being used to help a Russian oligarch evade sanctions. Kuncha Kerimova, the grantor, said the trust was designed to share her wealth with her grandchildren and other descendants, not to aid designated Russian billionaire Suleiman Kerimov.
Adam Szubin, former head of the Treasury Department’s Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence and director of the Office of Foreign Assets Control, has joined Covington, where he will work on sanctions, export controls, money laundering and investment security issues. Szubin, who mostly served in the George W. Bush and Obama administrations, was most recently a lawyer with Sullivan & Cromwell.
The following are short summaries of recent CBP NY rulings issued by the agency's National Commodity Specialist Division in New York:
Five importers challenging the tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that the government's defense of the tariffs' legality falls short. The importers, represented by the conservative advocacy group Liberty Justice Center, argued that IEEPA categorically doesn't provide for tariffs, IEEPA is precluded from being used to address trade deficits due to the existence of Section 122, and the Court of International Trade was right to issue an injunction against the tariffs (V.O.S. Selections v. Donald J. Trump, Fed. Cir. # 25-1812).