On May 29, 2020, the president announced in a White House press conference the Administration’s determination that Hong Kong is no longer sufficiently autonomous from the People’s Republic of China (“PRC”), and that the US Government would take “strong and meaningful” steps to “begin the process” of reviewing and revoking the “full range of agreements” that currently provide Hong Kong with preferential treatment under US law. This determination follows Secretary of State Michael Pompeo’s certification…
The EC announced on Tuesday that the export authorisation scheme for PPE ceased to apply as of Tuesday, 26 May 2020. The EC has decided not to extend the measure, initially introduced on 15 March to ensure adequacy of supply of such products in the EU in times of the COVID-19 pandemic. This measure was initially extended for another month on 26 April, implementing additional reporting requirements and limiting the scope of the scheme to…
The Communiqué No. 2020/8 Amending the Communiqué No. 96/31 on Goods Prohibited from Export or That Require Pre-Approval and the Communiqué No. 2020/9 on Amending the Communiqué No. 2006/7 on Goods Subject to Registration for Export (“Communiqués“) were published in the Official Gazette no. 31115 dated May 2, 2020. The Communiqués remove various export control measures imposed as part of COVID-19 pre-cautions on export transactions. Developments The government introduced a number of measures to combat…
On May 19, the US Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (“BIS”) published an interim final rule effective on May 15, 2020 amending the Export Administration Regulations’ (“EAR”) General Prohibition Three (the “foreign-produced direct product rule”) and Entity List to impose new controls on the reexport, export from abroad, and transfer (in-country) of certain foreign-produced semiconductor-related items when such items are the direct product of certain designated US technology or software and are destined…