The Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) designated Open Joint Stock Company Rosneft Oil Company (“Rosneft”) and Public Joint-Stock Company Oil Company Lukoil (“Lukoil”) on October 22, 2025, in response to the ongoing war in Ukraine. In announcing the designations under Executive Order (“EO”) 14024, Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent stated that the actions were taken to advance the administration’s goal of ending the war in Ukraine by targeting two of Russia’s largest oil…
On September 29, 2025, after some months of speculation, the US Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (“BIS”) issued an interim final rule “Expansion of End-User Controls to Cover Affiliates of Certain Listed Entities” (the “IFR”). The IFR immediately introduces a new “Affiliates Rule,” essentially a “50% ownership flow-down rule,” into the Export Administration Regulations (“EAR”). This marks a major shift in US export control policy by automatically extending certain EAR end user…
On August 26, 2025, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) published a final rule removing the Syrian Sanctions Regulations (31 CFR Part 542) from the Code of Federal Regulations (“OFAC Final Rule”). This action follows the issuance of Executive Order (“EO”) 14312 on June 30, 2025, which terminated the national emergency declared in EO 13338 and revoked multiple Syria-related sanctions authorities. Our blog post on the issuance of EO…
On April 16, 2025, the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) re-issued and updated its Advisory for Shipping and Maritime Stakeholders on Detecting and Mitigating Iranian Oil Sanctions Evasion (“the Advisory”), originally issued in September 2019. The updated Advisory is part of OFAC’s implementation of the February 4, 2025 National Security Presidential Memorandum (NSPM-2), which directs the Treasury Department to enact “maximum pressure” on Iran. The Advisory expands on the red flags…