On June 4, 2026, the US Department of State announced a new round of designations under Executive Order 14404 (“EO 14404”) targeting five entities and five individuals for being “associated with developing, implementing, and funding the Cuban regime’s violent revolutionary network.” Secretary of State Marco Rubio issued a press statement explaining the purpose of these designations. Concurrent with these designations, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) issued a new…
On March 27, 2026, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) significantly expanded the scope of authorizations available for the Venezuelan minerals sector by amending an existing general license and issuing two new general licenses covering a broad range of mining operations in Venezuela involving the Government of Venezuela (“GOV”) and CVG Compania General de Mineria de Venezuela CA (“Minerven”), or any entity in which Minerven owns, directly or indirectly,…
On March 6, 2026, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) continued its trend of selectively easing the Venezuela sanctions by (1) issuing General License No. 51 (“GL 51”), the first general license (“GL”) beyond the energy sector, and (2) publishing six new Frequently Asked Questions (“FAQs”) addressing the scope of several of the previously issued energy-related GLs. In parallel, Venezuela has begun reforming its mining sector. Background Since late…
This week, the US relaxation of sanctions against Venezuela’s oil and gas sector entered a new phase with the publication of a general license authorizing a broad range of upstream oil and gas activities. The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) has been busy with Venezuela-related actions over the past few weeks. We previously blogged about general licenses authorizing oil trading and downstream activities (blog post here) and the…