OFSI releases its third Annual Review for 2019-2020

16 October, 2020
On 9 October 2020, HM Treasury’s Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation (OFSI) published its latest Annual Review for the 2019-20 financial year. The publication marks the third report which OFSI have published and provides an overview of the work undertaken by OFSI in the financial year 2019-20 (April 2019 to March 2020). It also looks ahead to sanctions implementation in the future with a particular focus, this year, on how sanctions will be enforced at the end of the Brexit transition period. Points which may be of particular interest to readers are set out below. Read more

HSF Launches New Sanctions Blog

08 October, 2020
Herbert Smith Freehills' US Sanctions team has recently launched a new Sanctions blog. The blog will provide commentary on economic sanctions and export control issues, with a focus on US laws, and will be of particular interest to in-house counsel and compliance personnel in both US and non-US companies. Read more

Lisa Osofsky re-examines the priorities of the SFO at the Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime

28 September, 2020
On 7 September 2020, Lisa Osofsky, the Director of the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), delivered a keynote address at the Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime. In light of Covid-19, this year’s speech was delivered virtually, via YouTube. In her speech, Ms Osofsky re-examined the four key priorities that she outlined at her first address to the Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime in 2018 and referred to a number of new developments which she said would affect the SFO’s future work. Read more

Third HSF webinar in Global CC&I Conference series: sanctions developments in a turbulent global environment

07 September, 2020
Herbert Smith Freehills LLP’s Seventh Annual Corporate Crime & Investigations (“CC&I”) Conference is being held as a Global Conference Series of webinars over the upcoming months. The first webinar took place on 18 June 2020 and covered the topic of “CC&I in the time of Covid-19”. The second took place on 16 July 2020 and covered the topic of “2020 Developments in Anti-Bribery and Corruption and Deferred Prosecution Agreements”. The third took place on 20 August 2020 and covered the topic of “Sanctions developments in a turbulent global environment”. Read more

Corporate Crime update – August 2020

20 August, 2020
Welcome to the August 2020 edition of our corporate crime update - our round up of developments in relation to corruption, money laundering, fraud, sanctions and related matters. Read more

EU introduces sanctions in relation to cyberattacks

03 August, 2020
On 30 July 2020, the European Council announced that asset freezing sanctions were to be imposed on six Chinese and Russian individuals and three entities (based in China, Russia and North Korea) responsible for, or involved in, various cyberattacks, including the attempted cyberattack against the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and those publicly known as “WannaCry”, “NotPetya” and “Operation Cloud Hopper”. Read more

UK introduces human rights-related sanctions under post-Brexit sanctions framework

17 July, 2020
On 6 July 2020, the United Kingdom introduced unilateral sanctions against 49 individuals and entities from Saudi Arabia, Russia, Myanmar and North Korea accused of involvement in several high profile human rights violations and abuses. The Global Human Rights Sanctions Regulations 2020 (the “Sanctions Regulations”), made pursuant to the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018 ( “SAMLA”), are specifically tailored to address human rights abuses. Read more