Signing of the “Al-Ula Declaration” ending trade and other restrictions against Qatar As reported in our previous client update, on 5 January 2021, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and the rest of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member states, along with Egypt, signed the “Al-Ula Declaration” at the 41st GCC Summit held in the city of Al-Ula. This marks the end of a three and a half year boycott against…
From 1 January 2021, businesses must navigate a divergent UK-EU trade and competition regime for the first time in over forty years. The immediate priority is to ensure compliance with the new rules and regulations. Longer-term, business should also engage with the evolving ‘global Britain’ policy, and understand the risks as well as the opportunities as the UK re-engages with global relationships beyond the EU. Brexit Insights sessions Our market-leading UK trade and competition team…
The UK Department for International Trade has recently published guidance on how the UK will transpose and implement the EU Blocking Regulation (Council Regulation (EC) 2271/96) post-Brexit. The EU Blocking Regulation seeks to counter the extra-territorial impact of certain US sanctions (the “proscribed US sanctions”), currently in respect of Iran and Cuba (please see our previous blog post on updates of the EU Blocking Regulation in respect of Iran here). During the transition period, the…
The Department for International Trade has revealed in a notice to exporters that HMRC has received settlements totalling £700,368.01 for export control violations between March and September 2020.Fines of up to £211,250 were issued to exporters across 19 settlement actions for unlicensed exports of dual use goods, military goods and related activity controlled by the Export Control Order 2008. This is the highest annual total for export control fines to date.HMRC has a discretionary power…