The European Union's General Court annulled the 2019 and 2020 relisting acts for Libya's former minister for agriculture, animal and maritime resources, Abdel Majid Al-Gaoud, in a Sept. 15 order. The judgment removes Al-Gaoud from the EU's Libya sanctions regime. The former minister died in March 2021 and was delisted by the EU the following month. The court said that the European Council should have taken Al-Gaoud's circumstances into consideration when deciding whether to relist him in that he stopped being minister with the fall of Moammar Gadhafi's regime and was held in prison 2011 to 2017. The court also reasoned that Al-Gaoud's position as a former minister did “not have a sufficiently solid factual basis” that justified keeping him on the sanctions list. Had the council simply relied on his position as a former minister, his status would have been “frozen” and the council's periodic review provided for in listing measures would have had no practical effect, the court said.

Marco Dittrich, a Singapore-based importer, was fined $64,000 (in Singapore dollars) by the city-state's State Courts for evading Goods and Services Taxes on 46 shipments of bicycle frames and components, Singapore Customs said Sept. 17. The total amount of evaded GST was $13,483.89. Dittrich, the director of Singapore Tri-Global Pte. Ltd., pleaded guilty to one count under Singapore's Customs Act for undervaluing his import shipments. Under the Customs Act, fines can be levied “up to 20 times the amount of duty and GST evaded,” Singapore Customs said.

Kong Ming Jie, Singapore national and importer, was fined $50,000 by the Singapore State Courts for evading Goods and Services Taxes, submitting false declarations and failing to retain documents under the Customs Act, Singapore Customs said Sept. 10. Kong is the director of Nitecore Singapore Pte Ltd. and the only proprietor of Nitecore SG. Singapore Customs inspected a Nitecore shipment of LED flashlights and accessories at Changi Airfreight Centre in August 2019, finding that the declared value of the goods for one of the shipments was $400 but it was actually worth $23,336.47 (in Singapore dollars). For another shipment inspected the same month, Kong undervalued the goods by $8,000, Singapore Customs said. It said Kong pleaded guilty to five charges.

Two new advocates general have been appointed to the Court of Justice of the European Union and one new judge appointed to the bench at the General Court, the European Council said in a Sept. 8 press release. Anthony Collins of Ireland and Laila Medina of Latvia will serve as the two newest advocates general of the CJEU. Their tenures will run from Oct. 7 to Oct. 6, 2024, and Oct. 7 to Oct. 6, 2027, respectively. Since 14 judges and six advocates-general terms of office will expire on Oct. 6, Medina's appointment serves to fill one of the upcoming vacancies, while Collins' appointment fills the unexpired term of Gerard Hogan, who resigned his position. Peteris Zilgalvis of Latvia was appointed a judge of the General Court effective Sept. 8 until Aug. 31, 2025. His appointment partially renews the composition of the General Court of 2019, which had 23 judges with terms that expired on Aug. 31, 2019.

The European Union's use of trade defense measures in 2020, including antidumping and countervailing duties, succeeded despite COVID-19-related challenges, the European Commission said in a post highlighting its actions against unfair trade practices of the past year. The EU noted its temporary changes to regular practices, such as on-site verification visits. The commission also released statistics regarding its trade remedies. In all, the EU had 150 trade defense measures at the end of 2020, 10 more than in 2019, that included 128 antidumping measures, 19 antisubsidy duties and three safeguard measures. Ninety-nine of the 150 were imposed on China, nine on Russia, seven on India and six on the U.S. The commission also highlighted its new countervailing duties on cross-border financial support given by China to Chinese-owned companies making glass fiber fabrics and continuous filament glass fiber made in Egypt for export to the EU.

Vietnam's Hai Phong Customs Department launched the prosecution of a case of red sandalwood smuggling, the Customs Enforcement Team said Aug. 13 via the state-run Customs News website. The enforcement team detected a shipment of 297 sandalwood logs on the KMTC Tokyo container ship from Nhava Sheva Port in India that was transshipped across the Hong Kong Port to Vietnam's Dinh Vu Port May 26. The Hai Phong Customs Department initiated the shipper's criminal case July 30, transferring inspection documents and the wood to the Hai Phong Investigation Police Department, the report said.

Exports of legal services from the United Kingdom to Australia are expected to see big gains under the new trade agreement between the two countries, the U.K.'s Department for International Trade said Aug. 13. Due to guarantees from Australia, British lawyers can continue to provide their services in Australia “using their existing qualifications with more clarity and certainty,” the U.K. said. Covered services include arbitration, conciliation and mediation. Bureaucratic hurdles in obtaining the necessary licenses will be slashed as well, the U.K. said. Eligibility for junior lawyers seeking to work in Australia was increased to 35 years old from 30, the news release said.

Venezuela's Vice President Delcy Eloina Rodriguez Gomez will remain under the European Union's Venezuela sanctions regime after the European Union General Court rejected her application to annul the listings, a July 14 judgment said. The court said the European Council did not err in its finding that Rodriguez undermined democracy and the rule of law in Venezuela and that even if she no longer holds this position, she “remained linked to the regime.” This connection is enough to maintain the sanctions, the court said.

The EU General Court annulled the sanctions listing of Xavier Antonio Moreno Reyes, the secretary general of the National Electoral Council of Venezuela, in a July 14 ruling. The court dropped the sanctions designation after finding that the European Council had not established that the reasons for his listing were "well founded." The sanctions listing was not well-founded since the council did not show that Moreno Reyes approved the decisions of the National Electoral Council.

The European Union General Court dismissed a case from Iranian national Naser Bateni, who sought 250,000 euros in damages from his sanctions listings in 2011, 2012 and 2013, according to a July 7 judgment. Previous decisions from the court had annulled Bateni's listings for those years, finding that the European Council did not establish grounds that justified the designations and prompting the damages claim from Bateni. The court said that the council did not commit a "sufficiently serious breach" -- the standard for providing damages -- by relying on the information available to it when it made Bateni's sanctions determination. "The Council did not depart from the behavior which a normally prudent and diligent administration would have adopted," the judgment said. Bateni's appeal was "dismissed as being partly inadmissible and partly unfounded," according to an unofficial translation of the judgment.