Court of International Trade

The Court of International Trade has ruled to dismiss a case in which C.B. Imports Transamerica Corp. sought a refund of a cash deposit it made on an entry of automotive safety glass from China that was subject to an antidumping duty order (A-570-867) at the time of entry. The CIT dismissed the case as it found C.B. Imports' refund claim was made after the statutory two-year limit and thus was time-barred.

The Court of International Trade has ruled, due to untimely claims, it cannot grant relief to two companies that sought refunds of EU beef hormone dispute duties assessed on merchandise entered after the duties were retroactively terminated. According to the CIT, the companies' complaints were filed more than two years after the action that triggered accrual of their claims -- which was the date CBP liquidated the entries and not the date of the CAFC's 2010 ruling that the retaliatory duties were terminated by operation of law in 2007.

Mexican exporter Mueller (Mueller Comercial de Mexico, S. de R.L. de C.V.) and its U.S. importer Southland (Southland Pipe Nipples Co., Inc.), challenged the International Trade Administration’s assignment of an adverse facts-available AD duty rate higher than the all-others rate, in the AD administrative review of certain circular welded non-alloy steel pipe from Mexico for the November 2007- October 2008 period. The Court of International Trade agreed that the higher rate was unsupported.

The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled that countervailing duties may not be imposed on goods from China or other non-market economies¹, upholding a decision by the Court of International Trade, but on different grounds than the lower court, and overturning the attempts by the International Trade Administration since 2007 to apply CV duties to goods from China (a reversal of its earlier policy of not applying CVD law in NMEs).

Since the AD duty order on wooden bedroom furniture from China excludes benches but includes chests, importer Legacy Classic Furniture, Inc. challenged a finding by the International Trade Administration that the company’s combination bench-chests are included in the order. Among other factors it cited, the ITA reasoned that although the product has a padded top which purchasers could use for seating, the box design and cedar-lined storage unit were the item’s defining characteristics.

Vietnamese exporters challenged determinations by the International Trade Administration in the AD administrative review of certain frozen warm water shrimp from Vietnam for the February 2007 - January 2008 period. Notably, Viet Hai Seafood Co., Ltd., doing business as Vietnam Fish One Co., Ltd. challenged the ITA’s refusal to revoke the firm’s inclusion in the AD order despite zero dumping margins for three consecutive years. Fish One argued that: 1) the ITA’s regulations obliged it to perform individual reviews of companies requesting revocation based on achieving three years of zero or de minimis dumping margins, 2) the mandatory selection process, which was limited to only three exporters, was flawed and 3) the zero dumping margin it was assigned in the final results entitled it to revocation.

The Court of International Trade has ruled in U.S. v. Inner Beauty Int'l (USA) Ltd., that Inner Beauty must pay a civil penalty of $39,549 for filing documents falsely stating that the country of origin of certain entries of women's undergarments was Hong Kong, instead of China. The CIT found Inner Beauty made an inadvertent error and was culpable for negligence because at the time of the entries, such merchandise was subject to an import quota.

In Applikon Biotechnology, Inc. v. U.S., the Court of International Trade ruled against U.S. Customs and Border Protection's classification of certain Bioreactor Systems under HTS heading 8419 as machinery that treats materials through temperature change. The CIT held instead that the Bioreactor Systems are classified as other machinery under heading 8479 because their principal function is to grow cells, not to regulate temperature, and this function is not specified elsewhere in Chapter 84.

Two companies with a challenge to the International Trade Administration’s practice of zeroing (eliminating non-dumped sales from the margin calculation) pending at the Court of International Trade sought to delay the adjudication of their case until four other cases that address the same issue, and that are at a more advanced stage, are definitively resolved. The companies, Myonic GmbH and New Hampshire Ball Bearings, Inc., argued that a stay would “promote judicial economy and enable all parties to conserve resources.”

After extended litigation and multiple appeals led to a negative injury determination by the International Trade Commission, a group of overseas producer/exporters of ball bearings and parts thereof sought to have the Court of international Trade force the International Trade Administration to 1) terminate suspension of liquidation, 2) issue liquidation instructions and return all cash deposits for entries from the United Kingdom entered on or after August 25, 2010, and 3) issue liquidation instructions and return all cash deposits for entries from Japan entered on or after March 1, 2011. (The companies in this group are JTEKT Corporation, Koyo Corporation U.S.A., NSK Corporation, NSK Ltd., and NSK Europe Ltd.: the court case lists NSK Corporation et al. as plaintiffs and FAG Italia S.p.A. et al. as plaintiff-intervenors.)