After many rumors of potential changes to the U.S. policy on Venezuela, on October 18, 2023 the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued four general licenses, representing a significant shift in its Venezuela sanctions program. Most pertinent for the shipping industry, certain sanctions that were in place against Petróleos
After Venezuela’s government and its political opposition agreed on electoral guarantees for 2024 presidential elections, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued four general licenses suspending select sanctions:
As we are nearing the one-year anniversary of the Russian oil price cap, this is an important reminder to operators across the industry that enforcement will be coming.
Continue Reading A little less conversation, more action
On 2 August 2023 evening, the EU Commission released new FAQs (here and here; word search “2 August 2023”). Of greatest interest are the two new FAQs in the “Oil Import” section, relating to STS activity relating to Russian oil and petroleum products, in EU territorial waters. We set out extracts of these two below.
Continue Reading EU FAQs – STS in EU Territorial Waters
Although 2021 has predominantly been referred to as the “year of Russia” in terms of sanctions, the collapse of nuclear talks (JCPOA) as well as the social repression in the country have also shifted the focus to Iran, to some degree.
While designating members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Forces (IRGF) as Specially Designated Nationals
An alert was issued by the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on April 17 warning about the potential evasion of the Russian-origin oil price cap. The alert came after OFAC had received reports that oil exported from the Eastern Siberia Pacific (ESPO) pipeline or ports on Russia’s eastern coast was trading above the
The UK, EU and U.S. have each published the relevant price cap for petroleum products falling under HS/CN Code 2710 that are of Russian origin or consigned or exported from Russia to non-G7 countries (Restricted Petroleum Products), and have also updated their guidance on the scope and practical implementation of the price cap restrictions. We
The UK, EU and U.S. have each released information on the relevant price cap for oil products with HS/CN Code 2709 of Russian origin or exported from Russia shortly before the ban on maritime services for the transportation of Russian crude oil on December 5th, 2022. This announcement follows the publication of the UK’s “Maritime
The UK introduces a prohibition on maritime services for the supply or delivery of Russian origin or Russian consigned oil.
Continue Reading UK imposes oil price cap ban for maritime transport and services
In response to the on-going war in Ukraine, the UK enacted several new sanctions against Russia on July 21, 2022. These sanctions are far-reaching and will place restrictions on a variety of industries such as oil, insurance, energy, gold, and coal, as well as to the provision of professional and business services to Russia.
While