The Bureau of Industry and Security recently published its response to an advisory opinion request on whether certain information shared with the International Civil Aviation Organization during aircraft standards development activities would be subject to the Export Administration Regulations. The requester, whose name was redacted, believes that the information contains “non-proprietary system descriptions” and therefore isn’t subject to the EAR.
Ian Cohen
Ian Cohen, Deputy Managing Editor, is a reporter with Export Compliance Daily and its sister publications International Trade Today and Trade Law Daily, where he covers export controls, sanctions and international trade issues. He previously worked as a local government reporter in South Florida. Ian graduated with a journalism degree from the University of Florida in 2017 and lives in Washington, D.C. He joined the staff of Warren Communications News in 2019.
New guidance from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. could significantly curtail the use of “springing rights” deals, leading to “substantial challenges” and delays of certain investments, law firms said this month. Other new CFIUS guidance puts companies “on notice” that the committee will demand information on limited partners involved in a transaction, despite any previously made confidentiality agreements.
The Bureau of Industry and Security has had “more than enough time” to issue a final version of its October China chip export controls, which need to be “strengthened” and “vigorously enforced” to maintain American semiconductor leadership, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said in a May 30 letter to Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo. Rubio asked the agency when it plans to issue the final rule, what changes will be made, whether BIS had “delayed” finalizing the rule and more.
Several companies this month disclosed potential export control or sanctions violations or updated the status of their current disclosures, including an information technology services company, an investment firm and a digital asset services company. The potential violations involve a business trying to exit the Russian market, a company potentially illegally sending export-controlled data and a firm waiting years for a response to two sanctions disclosures.
The U.S. should convince the U.N. to harmonize its sanctions lists with U.S. trade blacklists, a House Financial Services subcommittee heard during a hearing last week. Aligning the lists could require the World Bank and other international organizations to adhere to U.S. sanctions, one witness said, and help the U.S. extend the reach of its restrictions against China.
The Commerce Department should amend several portions of its proposed guardrails on recipients of Chips Act funding, including measures that could prevent the U.S. chip industry from participating in international standards bodies or inhibit “routine” business activities, trade groups and technology companies said in comments released this week. Some said Commerce should also limit which companies qualify as “foreign entities of concern” and revise the rule’s proposed definition for “legacy semiconductor” to more closely align with export controls.
The State Department is working on a new trade authorization that would expedite technology transfers among the U.S., the U.K. and Australia, said Jessica Lewis, assistant secretary of the State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs. Lewis, testifying before the House Foreign Affairs Committee May 24, said she’s also open to legislation that could reduce export licensing burdens, especially as part of the Australia-U.K.-U.S. (AUKUS) partnership.
The U.S. should impose a range of new sanctions and other restrictions on Chinese companies with ties to human rights violations in the Xinjiang region, including by imposing financial sanctions on companies on the Entity List and introducing outbound investment restrictions, the House Select Committee on China said this week. The committee also said the U.S. and its allies need to better coordinate on a potential sanctions response -- and be ready to deploy those measures -- if China invades Taiwan.
Germany charged four managers of spyware company FinFisher with intentionally violating dual-use export controls after they sold surveillance products, without licenses, to countries outside the EU. The managers of the FinFisher group of companies, which were some of the “world's leading” spyware firms before declaring insolvency last year, never “even applied for” export licenses from German authorities and tried to evade detection, Munich’s public prosecutor announced this week, according to an unofficial translation.
Concern is “growing” within the U.S., Australia and the U.K. that “indiscriminate and extraterritorial application” of the International Traffic in Arms Regulations will hurt the Australia-U.K.-U.S. (AUKUS) partnership and “slow-roll cooperation on existing technology transfer,” the Sydney-based U.S. Studies Centre said in a report released this month. The report warned that “another failure” to reform the ITAR could “carry significant consequences for the three countries’ shared defence technology advantages vis-a-vis China and, therefore, their ability to deter regional conflict.”