Antidumping duty petitioner American HFC Coalition took to the Court of International Trade to contest the Commerce Department's decision not to use Mexico as the primary surrogate nation in the 2021-22 review of the antidumping duty order on hydrofluorocarbon blends from China (The American HFC Coalition v. United States, CIT # 24-00071).
Sullivan & Cromwell last week announced that it's creating a national security practice focusing on economic sanctions, anti-money laundering laws, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act investigations, foreign investment regulations, export controls and import restrictions.
Germany-based private airline company Hahn Air Lines and its Minnesota-based subsidiary, Hahn Air USA, will pay $26.8 million to settle allegations the companies violated the False Claims Act by "knowingly failing to remit to the United States certain travel fees" the airline collected from commercial passengers flying to or within the U.S., DOJ announced.
Houston residents Muzzamil Zaidi and Asim Mujtaba Naqvi pleaded guilty last week for their role in a scheme to send money to Iran without permission from the Office of Foreign Assets Control, DOJ announced.
The Court of International Trade on May 3 entered judgment for importer Fraserview Remanufacturing after CBP corrected the liquidation status of the company's entries. In January, the trade court said Fraserview didn't need a protest to file suit at the court for entries that were erroneously deemed liquidated while liquidation was suspended (see 2401250039) (Fraserview Remanufacturing v. U.S., CIT # 22-00244).
Importer van Gelder on May 3 moved to set aside the Court of International Trade's dismissal of its case for failure to prosecute, arguing that its counsel "overlooked -- by virtue of a calendaring mistake" -- the new deadline for the case after it was extended on the customs case management calendar (van Gelder v. U.S., CIT # 21-00160).
The U.S. on May 3 defended its claim that anti-forced labor nonprofit International Rights Advocates doesn't have standing to sue CBP over its inaction in responding to a petition alleging cocoa from Cote d'Ivoire is made with forced child labor. Filing a brief in support of its motion to dismiss the suit, the government argued that IRAdvocates can't show injury-in-fact from CBP's purported inaction, and that the Court of International Trade can't compel discretionary law enforcement action in the form of a withhold release order (International Rights Advocates v. Alejandro Mayorkas, CIT # 23-00165).
A Spanish olive growers industry group, Asociacion de Exportadores e Industriales de Aceitunas de Mesa, along with Agro Sevilla Aceitunas and Angel Camacho Alimentacion, brought suit at the Court of International Trade to contest the Commerce Department's finding that demand for the "prior stage product" is "substantially dependent" on demand for the "latter stage product," in the 2021 review of the countervailing duty order on ripe olives from Spain (Asociacion de Exportadores e Industriales de Aceitunas de Mesa v. United States, CIT # 24-00078).
The Court of International Trade on May 1 and May 2 dismissed two lawsuits -- one at the behest of the plaintiff, Vinh Hoan Corp., the other for lack of prosecution. Vinh Hoan contested the Commerce Department's final results in the 2021-22 review of the antidumping duty order on frozen fish fillets from Vietnam. Plaintiff's counsel Matthew McConkey said the voluntary dismissal was filed after later action from Commerce "demonstrated our issue of concern was moot, especially as our calculated rate was 0%." Importer van Gelder's suit challenging the classification of its floor covering (vinyl tiles) was dismissed because the suit wasn't removed prior to the expiration of the customs case management calendar's period of time of removal (Vinh Hoan Corp. v. U.S., CIT # 24-00077) (van Gelder v. U.S., CIT # 21-00160).
The presumption of foreign state control in antidumping duty cases doesn't disappear after the exporter presents "minimal contradictory evidence," the government said in a reply brief on May 1 at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Contrary to claims made by exporters Aeolus Tyre Co. and Guizhou Tyre Co., the government said, the Commerce Department "has long required respondents to demonstrate autonomy with respect to" all four criteria used to assess freedom from foreign state control, even for companies only minority-owned by a government entity (Guizhou Tyre Co. v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-2163).