Sanctions Top-5 for the week ending 10 January 2020

Here are five things that happened this week in the world of economic sanctions that I think you should know about.

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1. The White House announced the issuance of Executive Order 13902 imposing sanctions (including secondary sanctions) with respect to Iran's construction, mining, manufacturing, and textiles sectors. Meanwhile, the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) named numerous companies in Iran, China, Oman, and Seychelles as Specially Designated Nationals (SDNs) under Executive Order 13871 for their involvement in Iran's metals sectors. (Read my team's analysis on the Steptoe & Johnson International Regulation and Compliance blog.)
2. In related news, OFAC targeted eight senior Iranian government officials for their roles in ballistic missile strikes against US forces in Iraq, which followed the targeted killing of Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani in a US drone strike earlier this month.
3. The US District Court for the Southern District of Florida dismissed two claims against cruise companies under Title III of the Helms-Burton Act (find the cases here and here). The Court held that the defendants did not traffic in property subject to Title III by docking at a port facility in Cuba previously owned by a US national because the plaintiff's Cuban lease would have expired several years before the arrival of the defendants' cruise ships. (See my earlier discussion of Title III from April 2019.)
4. In related news, the US Department of Transportation issued a notice restricting public charter flights from the United States to Cuban airports except Jose Marti International Airport in Havana. According to a State Department news release, the action, which follows a similar restriction in October 2019, is intended to "further restrict the Cuban regime’s ability to obtain revenue, which it uses to finance its ongoing repression of the Cuban people and its unconscionable support for dictator Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela."
5. OFAC designated Taban Deng Gai, South Sudan's First Vice President, as an SDN under the Global Magnitsky program for his involvement in serious human rights abuses against members of the country's opposition movement, including the disappearance and suspected deaths of two activists in 2017.  

Comments

Depending on how it is used, Executive Order 13902 could significantly expand the scope of US secondary sanctions by targeting sectors of the Iranian economy that were previously excluded from Executive Order 13846 of 6 August 2018 and Executive Order 13871 of 8 May 2019. Additionally, the new Executive Order 13902 authorizes secondary sanctions against foreign financial institutions that engage in certain transactions related to the newly covered sectors. OFAC has yet to issue guidance interpreting the terms construction, mining, manufacturing, or textiles or authorize the winding down of existing contracts and transactions.

On Tuesday this week, the foreign ministers of the United Kingdom, France, and Germany notified Iran that they would invoke the dispute resolution mechanism under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), following the Iranian government's announcement on 5 January 2020 that it would cease complying with certain limitations in the agreement. More on this next week . . .

Bonus item: The Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists (ACAMS) announced the appointment of Justine Walker, former Director of Sanctions Policy at UK Finance, as ACAMS's Head of Global Sanctions and Risk. Congrats, Justine!

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(The views expressed are my own and do not constitute legal advice. Photo from Vladislav Reshetnyak.)