U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has issued a notice regarding the appeals period for questions on the October 2003 Customs broker exam.

The International Maritime Organization (IMO) has issued a circular urging SOLAS Contracting Governments, port authorities, classification societies, recognized security organizations, training institutions and all other parties concerned to redouble their efforts to protect shipping against terrorism by taking action as soon as possible to ensure compliance with the requirements of the International Ship and Port Facility Security Code (ISPS Code) and SOLAS Chapter XI-2 before these new maritime security measures enter into force on July 1, 2004.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has made available on its Web site an updated document on the U.S./Canada Free and Secure Trade (FAST) program.

The International Trade Administration (ITA) has issued its preliminary results of the following antidumping (AD) duty administrative reviews:

The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) has issued an interim final rule, effective January 16, 2004, which amends the Chemical Weapons Convention Regulations (CWCR) in 15 CFR Part 711 by adding instructions on how to obtain authorization from BIS to make electronic submissions of declarations and reports required under the CWCR through the Web-Data Entry System for Industry (Web-DESI), etc.

CBP has issued messages on a number of antidumping (AD) and countervailing (CV) duty actions, many of which (marked by an * in the action column) were previously published in the Federal Register by the International Trade Administration (ITA) and summarized in International Trade Today.

The Winter 2003 issue of the NCBFAA Quarterly Bulletin contains an article that states that miscellaneous tariff and trade bills are no longer routine, are not predictable, and may not even be possible. The article notes that such bills have increasingly become the vehicle for solving larger, tougher trade and economic issues that have nothing to do with the tedious technical language of miscellaneous tariff and trade bills. (NBFAA Quarterly Bulletin, No. 103-4, Winter 2003, www.ncbfaa.org.)

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has issued a set of responses to 18 "technical" frequently asked questions (FAQ) related to the Sea Automated Manifest System (AMS) Special Bill process (the new non-vessel operating common carrier (NVOCC) and Master vessel operating common carrier (VOCC) bill types).

The European Union (EU) is requesting World Trade Organization (WTO) authorization to apply retaliatory sanctions against the U.S. for its failure to bring the Continued Dumping and Subsidy Offset Act of 2000 (Byrd Amendment) into conformity with WTO rules by December 27, 2003. The EU states that this deadline for compliance with the WTO Appellate Body's ruling passed without action from U.S. Congress to repeal the measure.

The Commerce Department's Office of Textiles and Apparel (OTEXA) has issued its November 2003 Textiles and Apparel Import Report, which includes statistics on general imports (both quota and non-quota) of cotton, wool, man-made fiber, silk blend, and non-cotton vegetable fiber textiles and apparel.