Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2662 actions· ✨ 89 recent

The Russia (Sanctions) (EU Exit) (Amendment) (No. 4) Regulations 2023 (SI 2023/1364) amend the Russia (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 to prohibit UK persons from acquiring, importing, supplying or delivering listed Russian-origin metals and metal articles, delivering the Prime Minister's commitment to ban Russian copper, nickel and aluminium. Per law-firm summaries the list (a new Schedule 3BA) also covers lead, zinc, tin, tungsten, molybdenum, tantalum, magnesium, cobalt, antimony, manganese and further metals, and most provisions took effect on 15 December 2023 with a grace period for cargoes consigned before that date.

On 8 December 2023 the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) published a direct final rule (88 FR 85479; FR Doc 2023-26532) making two export-liberalisation amendments to the Export Administration Regulations (EAR). First, BIS removes Chemical and Biological Weapons (CB) proliferation column controls from the Commerce Country Chart for exports of certain pathogens and toxins (ECCNs 1C351, 1C353, and 1C354) when destined to Australia Group (AG) member countries, on the basis that AG members operate equivalent domestic CBW-export controls. Second, the rule revises the Crime Control and Detection (CC) column entries for Austria, Finland, Ireland, Liechtenstein, South Korea, Sweden, and Switzerland, reflecting the updated US assessment of those countries' law-enforcement export-control standards. Both changes are effective on publication and reduce US export-licensing burdens for allied-country destinations without altering controls for non-allied markets.

The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) added 49 entities under 52 entries to the Entity List, effective October 11, 2023. The bulk of additions — 42 of 49 — are Chinese entities determined to be acting contrary to US national security or foreign policy interests, predominantly for supplying US-origin integrated circuits to Russian defense-sector consignees after March 1, 2023 in violation of export controls. Remaining entities span Estonia, Finland, Germany, India, Turkey, UAE, and the United Kingdom and were designated on similar Russia-diversion or end-use violation grounds. All listed parties face a license requirement for all EAR-subject items, reviewed under a presumption of denial.

Finance (No. 2) Act 2023 (c. 30), receiving royal assent on 11 July 2023, enacts the UK's domestic implementation of the OECD/G20 Pillar Two GloBE (Global Anti-Base Erosion) rules via two interlocking charges: Part 3 establishes the Multinational Top-up Tax (MTT) — the UK's IIR-equivalent charge on UK members of MNE groups whose jurisdictional effective tax rate (ETR) falls below 15% in any territory — and Part 4 establishes the Domestic Top-up Tax (DTT), the UK's Qualified Domestic Minimum Top-up Tax (QDMTT) that collects top-up on UK-located constituents before any foreign IIR can apply. Both charges apply to UK members of MNE groups with consolidated group revenue ≥ EUR 750 million for accounting periods beginning on or after 31 December 2023; section 121 of the Act expressly states that the purpose of Part 3 is "to implement the provisions of the Pillar Two rules relating to top-up tax." The UK adopted a "redrafted in domestic style" transposition approach — writing the GloBE mechanics into UK statute rather than straight transposition of OECD model language — a method subsequently mirrored by Korea's AITA Chapter V approach.

BIS published a final rule adding 43 entities under 50 entries to the EAR Entity List and removing one entity (Fiber Optic Solutions, Latvia), effective June 12, 2023. The additions span ten countries — China (31 entities), UAE (5), Pakistan (4), South Africa (3), UK (2), and one each in Kenya, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand — targeting four principal threat clusters: China's military modernization and hypersonic-weapons supply chain, an international network of flight-training academies (TFASA and affiliates) providing Western pilot training to Chinese military personnel, Pakistan-linked procurement for unsafeguarded ballistic-missile programs, and UAE/South Africa-based dual-use diversion networks. All listed entities require a BIS licence, with most subject to a presumption of denial.

The UK government published its National Semiconductor Strategy on 19 May 2023, under Secretary of State Michelle Donelan at the newly established Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT). The strategy commits GBP 1 billion in long-run support to the UK semiconductor sector, explicitly focusing on the UK's identified strengths: chip design (Arm, Imagination Technologies, Dialog), compound and wide-bandgap semiconductors (III-V, SiC, GaN -- centred on the Cardiff/Newport cluster and IQE plc), and upstream academic R&D. Unlike the US CHIPS Act or EU Chips Act, the strategy explicitly declined to fund advanced silicon wafer fabrication at scale, acknowledging the prohibitive capital cost and the UK's lack of existing fab infrastructure at leading nodes. A UK Semiconductor Advisory Panel was established to guide delivery and assess emerging requirements. The strategy is enabled by the UK Subsidy Control Act 2022 (in force January 2023), which freed UK public authorities to grant large technology subsidies without prior EU Commission approval.

On 24 February 2023, to mark the one-year anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the UK government announced a new sanctions package including an import ban on over 140 goods (including iron and steel products processed in third countries), an export ban on battlefield-relevant goods, and 92 new asset-freeze designations. The measures were legislated by the Russia (Sanctions) (EU Exit) (Amendment) Regulations 2023 (SI 2023/440), which came into force on 21 April 2023, except the third-country-processed iron and steel import provision (Regulation 3), which came into force on 30 September 2023.