A new report by the Government Accountability Office examines the “illicit financial flows” supporting the Venezuelan government and U.S. efforts to disrupt those transactions, including through sanctions. Although U.S. agencies have “provided assistance to partner countries in the region to build their capacity to disrupt criminal activity” involving Venezuela, Treasury Department officials told the GAO that “the volume of illicit financial flows is overwhelming for many partners in the region.”

The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week sanctioned 10 people and one company involved in illegal Mexican drug trafficking, including precursor chemicals used in fentanyl. Those designated have ties to Mexico-based Sinaloa Cartel, OFAC said, and the measures follow a series of similar sanctions related to the group in recent months (see 2305090022, 2304140051 and 2301300010).

The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week sanctioned Serbian official Aleksandar Vulin, who has been “implicated” in transnational organized crime, illegal drug operations and “misuse of public office.” Vulin, director of Serbia’s Security Information Agency, worked with U.S.-sanctioned Serbian arms dealer Slobodan Tesic by helping him move illegal arms shipments across the country’s border, and has also used his position to support Russia and give the country “a platform to further its influence in the region.”

American universities and research labs should make sure they’re screening against a new Defense Department list of Chinese, Russian and Iranian institutions that have “elevated risks,” Crowell & Mooring said in a July 11 client alert. The list, published by DOD June 30, includes more than 45 entities that “have been confirmed as engaging in problematic activity,” including behavior that increases the risk that DOD-funded research could be “misappropriated to the detriment of national or economic security.”

The Office of Foreign Assets Control on July 11 updated the Specially Designated Nationals List entry for Andrey Nikolayevich Ivanov, a Wagner Group official who has helped the sanctioned Russian private military company in weapons deals, mining activities and more. OFAC sanctioned Ivanov in June (see 2306270056).

President Joe Biden this week renewed a national emergency authorizing certain sanctions related to Hong Kong. The White House said "recent actions taken by the People’s Republic of China to fundamentally undermine Hong Kong’s autonomy" continue to threaten U.S. national security. The sanctions were renewed for another year from July 14.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week issued a final rule to implement a 2022 executive order that created new sanctions against terrorist organizations, criminal groups and others who take hostages (see 2207190045). The rule describes various prohibitions, gives licensing information, provides definitions, outlines penalties and recordkeeping requirements, and more. The Hostages and Wrongful Detention Sanctions Regulations are effective July 11.

Treasury Deputy Secretary Wally Adeyemo met with EU officials and industry executives this week to discuss Russia sanctions and efforts to “prevent sanctions evasion,” the agency said. Along with European Commission Executive Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis, Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni, and Secretary-General Stefano Sannino, Adeyemo also met with clean energy industry officials in Belgium. He also discussed evasion of Russian sanctions with ambassadors to the EU from Greece, Cyprus, and Malta.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control this week again renewed a Venezuela-related license that authorizes certain transactions related to exports or reexports of liquefied petroleum gas to Venezuela (see 2107120054 and 2207070032). General License No. 40B, which replaces General License No 40A, is valid through 12:01 a.m. EDT July 10, 2024. The license was scheduled to expire July 12.

The Office of Foreign Assets Control will retire its “PIP, DEL, and SDALL.ZIP sanctions list file formats” in August but continue to offer for public download the “XML, CSV, and FF file formats, the ZIP files SDN_XML and SDN_Advanced, and PDF versions” for the agency’s sanctions lists, it said in a notice last week. The notice includes a complete list of files that the agency will retire. OFAC said its Sanctions List Search tool “will not be affected by these changes, and users of the search tool will not experience any loss of service.”