On October 6, 2017, the State Department announced that the U.S. would permanently lift the embargo on Sudan effective October 12, 2017. The decision comes 10 months after President Obama lifted the embargo on an interim...more
On Friday, June 16, President Trump announced policy changes towards Cuba while speaking in Miami. Trump’s new policy directive reverses many of the Obama administration’s policies with Cuba. ...more
As much of the world now knows, beginning in January 2015, the Obama Administration began easing some of the sanctions that have been imposed on Cuba for generations. Since that easing, there has been a great deal of interest...more
Throughout the eight years of the Obama administration, the development and implementation of economic sanctions was a key element of U.S. foreign and national security policy. This strategy continued into the post-election...more
On January 13, the US Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued a general license that authorizes all transactions with Sudan that were previously prohibited by the Sudanese Sanctions...more
SHINING LIGHT INTO THE HEART OF DARKNESS:An Update on the Cuban Embargo - I. Executive Summary - Sixty years after the imposition of the Cuban Embargo, the orthodoxy and ideology that caused it to persist are no...more
After the announcement of Fidel Castro’s death on November 26, 2016, President Barack Obama sent a message to the Cuban people highlighting his administration’s efforts to improve relations between the United States and Cuba....more
Bob Dylan won the Nobel Prize for literature. Those were words I never thought I would see in the same sentence, let alone write in the same sentence. Yet here we are, the first rock and roller to win the Nobel Prize. While...more
On March 20, 2016, President Obama became the first United States president in almost 90 years to visit the island of Cuba, located a mere 90 miles from the coast of Florida—signaling not only a renewed diplomatic...more
President Obama Highlights TPP, Cuba Embargo in Final State of the Union Address - On January 12, President Obama delivered his seventh and final State of the Union Address to Congress and the American people. Among the...more
On January 12, President Obama delivered his seventh and final State of the Union Address to Congress and the American people. Among the many topics that he raised in this annual speech were two trade-related priorities that...more
On January 25, 2016, the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and the US Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) announced new changes to existing US sanctions on Cuba,...more
Before leaving Washington, D.C. for the holidays, President Obama signed H.R. 2029 (Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2016), which repealed the ban on U.S. exports of crude oil. The repeal occurred just few days before...more
Cuba banned all private enterprise and foreign investment following Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution. For more than 50 years, the U.S. has imposed an almost total embargo on all trade with the largest Caribbean island nation. ...more
Amendment triggers change in EAR de minimis level for controlled US-origin content in foreign made products. On April 14, US President Barack Obama submitted to Congress the statutorily required report indicating the...more
On July 1, President Obama announced that the United States and Cuba had reached agreement on the reestablishment of diplomatic relations and that the two countries would soon reopen embassies in each other’s capitals for the...more
In a move that may honestly mean more to America than to Cuba, the White House has announced that President Obama will remove Cuba from the U.S. list of “State Sponsors of Terrorism.” The U.S. Department of State has listed...more
President Obama has asked Congress to take Cuba off the list of countries that sponsor terrorism. The President made a formal recommendation to Congress, setting in motion a 45-day review process during which lawmakers can...more
After President Obama's announcement that his Administration will pursue a policy aimed at improving U.S.-Cuba diplomatic relations and ultimately eliminating the economic embargo on Cuba, the U.S. Treasury and Commerce...more
As part of a broader, ongoing effort to forge closer relations with Cuba, the Obama administration has enacted a new set of regulations intended to facilitate certain forms of authorized travel to Cuba. The regulations, which...more
On January 16, 2015, the Office of Foreign Assets Control, U.S. Department of the Treasury (“OFAC”), and the Bureau of Industry and Security, U.S. Department of Commerce (“BIS”), each published regulations implementing the...more
On January 15, 2015, the Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) amended the Cuban Assets Control Regulations to implement changes in U.S. policy toward Cuba announced by President Obama on December...more
On January 15, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) released important updates to the Cuban Assets Control Regulations (“CACR”). The U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry...more
New Rules Open Opportunities for Exports, Financial Services, and Travel- On January 16, 2014, the U.S. Treasury Department issued new sanctions regulations easing the 54-year old Cuban embargo. Coming in the wake of...more
On January 16, 2015, the U.S. Department of the Treasury (“Treasury”) amended the Cuban Assets Control Regulations, 31 C.F.R. Part 515 (“CACR”), and the U.S. Department of Commerce amended the Export Administration...more