The Export-Import Bank of the U.S. is opening a 14-day comment period on an application for a $21 million guarantee to support the $19 million export of a wire rod mill to the Czech Republic, it said in a Federal Register notice scheduled for Aug. 31. The U.S. export will replace an existing facility and enable the Czech company to expand production of wire rod by around 50,000 metric tons annually during the 8.5-year repayment term. Comments are due Sept. 14 to economic.impact@exim.gov.
Dugie Standeford
Dugie Standeford, European Correspondent, Communications Daily and Privacy Daily, is a former lawyer. She joined Warren Communications News in 2000 to report on internet policy and regulation. In 2003 she moved to the U.K. and since then has covered European telecommunications issues. She previously covered the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration and intellectual property law matters. She has a degree in psychology from Duke University and a law degree from the University of Tulsa College of Law.
The State Department, World Health Organization, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have recently issued the following travel warnings, travel alerts, country specific information sheets, and disease outbreak-related information: State Department Travel Warnings are issued when the State Department decides, based on all relevant information, to recommend that Americans avoid travel to certain countries.
A Miami-based ship surveyor was sentenced to 21 months in prison for lying to the Coast Guard and falsely certifying that inspections had been carried out on two ships, the Department of Justice said Aug. 29. The inspections were designed to ensure that the ships were seaworthy and didn't pose a threat to the crew or the marine environment, said Ignacia Moreno, assistant attorney general for the environment and natural resources division.
Britain's HM Revenue & Customs isn't doing nearly enough to fight alcohol duty evasion, the U.K. Parliament Commons Committee of Public Accounts said in a critical report published Aug. 29. The department launched a renewed strategy in 2010 to reduce the amount of tax lost each year to duty evasion, often through fraud which involves exporting duty-unpaid alcohol to the Continent which is then redirected to the U.K. and marketed with no duty paid, the panel said.