Today, on 22 February 2017, the Swiss Federal Council further tightened the Swiss trade sanctions against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) by amending its Ordinance on Measures against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea of 25 October 2006. The new provisions enter into force today at 6pm. Switzerland hereby implements binding UN Security Council (UNSC) Resolution 2321 (2016) of 30 November, adopted in response to DPRK’s fifth nuclear test, conducted on 9…
Background On 18 February 2017, China’s Ministry of Commerce and General Administration of Customs jointly issued Announcement [2017] No. 12 (“Announcement No. 12”), imposing a blanket suspension on imports of coal produced in North Korea for the rest of the year. The suspension includes imports for which applications have been made, but not yet processed by Customs. Announcement No. 12 takes effect from 19 February 2017, and will be effective till 31 December 2017. Announcement…
On February 8, 2017, the US Bureau of Industry and Security (“BIS”) announced that it has updated the content of its Export Compliance Guidelines (“Guidelines”) and Audit Module (“Module”) and combined both documents into one “easy-to-use” booklet. We understand that BIS’s primary purpose in updating the Guidelines and Module was to shorten and simplify them because, in BIS’s view, the prior versions of the documents were too long and contained too much unnecessary technical language.
Background In response to the nuclear test conducted by North Korea in September, China’s Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence, the China Atomic Energy Authority and General Administration of Customs jointly issued Announcement [2017] No. 9 (“Announcement No. 9”) on 25 January 2017. This was issued in conjunction with the U.N. Security Council Resolution 2321 (2016), adopted on November 30,…