The U.N. this month launched an online sanctions research platform, an “independent reference tool for collecting, researching and analyzing global sanction data,” the organization said in a press release. The platform is available in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish and is open to anyone “interested in or working on issues related to sanctions and their impact, with no access or usage restrictions.” The tool is aimed at providing a “comprehensive online repository” for information on sanctions and their impact on human rights.
The U.S., Japan and South Korea last week agreed to boost export control cooperation -- including enforcement -- to prevent technologies with military or dual-use applications from being “illegally exported or stolen abroad.” The commitment was one of several made after Aug. 18 meetings at Camp David -- the first stand-alone summit among the three nation’s leaders -- and “signifies a new era of trilateral cooperation," National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said.
The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week sanctioned four people involved in the poisoning of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. OFAC said Alexey Alexandrovich Alexandrov, Konstantin Kudryavtsev, Ivan Vladimirovich Osipov and Vladimir Alexandrovich Panyaev are Russian Federal Security Service operatives who were reported to be involved in the attack on Navalny. All four were previously sanctioned under the Magnitsky Act of 2012 for their ties to “extrajudicial killings, torture, or other gross violations of internationally recognized human rights committed against individuals seeking to expose illegal activity carried out” by Russia, the agency said.
Charles McGonigal, a former senior FBI official, pleaded guilty in connection with a scheme to violate U.S. sanctions against Russia, DOJ announced Aug. 15. McGonigal was charged with conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act in January after DOJ said he “provided services” to sanctioned Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska in exchange for payments, including by agreeing to investigate a Russian oligarch who was a rival of Deripaska (see 2301230030 and 2308080030).
The U.S. this week sanctioned three entities for their involvement in a sanctions evasion network that facilitates arms deals between Russia and North Korea. The designations target Limited Liability Company Verus, Defense Engineering Limited Liability Partnership and Versor S.R.O, which all have ties to sanctioned Slovakian businessman Ashot Mkrtychev. The Treasury Department said Mkrtychev is the president of Versor, founder and owner of Verus and the sole director of Defense Engineering, and has worked with Russian and North Korean officials for “potential plans” to transfer more than two dozen kinds of weapons and munitions to Russia in exchange for various raw materials and commodities to North Korea.
Compliance departments need to be increasingly “creative” to catch goods or transactions that may be tied to Russian sanctions evasion, an industry official and former Treasury Department official said this week, especially as the U.S. and its allies ramp up enforcement. They also said compliance is growing more complex, particularly for financial institutions, which must meet expanding government expectations outlined in joint alerts recently published by the Commerce and Treasury departments.
The U.S. removed sanctions from two former board members of a Russian state-owned bank after both argued they didn’t meet the criteria for placement on the Treasury Department’s Specially Designated Nationals List. The sanctions removals, made by the Office of Foreign Assets Control late last month, came after Russian nationals Elena Titova and Andrey Golikov, in separate complaints, sued the U.S. government over their designations, accusing it of sanctioning them on “no factual basis” and “unnecessarily” delaying delisting decisions.
A group of European countries not in the EU aligned with recent sanctions moves from the European Council regarding Iran's support for Russia's war in Ukraine, serious human rights abuses and the situation in Myanmar.
The U.K.'s Export Control Joint Unit on Aug. 11 issued a new general license under its Russia sanctions regime permitting the provision of certain legal advice and services. The license authorizes legal advisory services to any person or entity related to whether an "act or a proposed act complies with" sanctions, export and import controls on Russia. Parties may now provide legal advisory services surrounding the risk of "punitive measures" concerning sanctions on Russia, any Russian laws that "have as their object or effect the frustration of any laws specified [in any restrictive measures] including sanctions, export and import controls or other restrictive measures imposed by Russia"; or "any criminal law imposed by any jurisdiction."
Sen. Bob Menendez of New Jersey, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, asked the Kyrgyz Republic to “swiftly” investigate allegations that the country’s government has helped Russia evade international sanctions. In an Aug 8 letter to President Sadyr Japarov, Menendez said Kyrgyzstan has “dramatically expanded its import-export business with Russia” since Russia launched its war against Ukraine, and said Kyrgyzstan’s “lack of enforcement or worse -- complicit facilitation of trade with Russia in products that implicate sanctions, such as drones, aircraft parts, weapon accessories, and circuitry -- is reportedly enabling Russia to evade international sanctions.”