The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
Liquified natural gas export project Magnolia LNG withdrew from a lawsuit filed by the Sierra Club challenging the Department of Energy's Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management approval of Magnolia LNG's and Golden Pass LNG Terminal's applications to increase their authorized LNG export volumes. Submitting its motion on Dec. 1 to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, Magnolia said it wanted to withdraw as a respondent-intervenor "because it has determined to move forward with a new application to Energy for authorization to export LNG to non-free trade nations" (Sierra Club v. U.S. Department of Energy, D.C. Cir. # 22-1217).
The Court of International Trade in a Dec. 6 order postponed a hearing on Chinese exporter Ninestar Corp.'s motion for a preliminary injunction in the company's suit against its placement on the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List. The parties asked for a delay in the hearing while they negotiate a process for the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force to consider a request for removal from the UFLPA Entity List by Ninestar (see 2312050023) (Ninestar Corp. v. United States, CIT # 23-00182).
Textile gloves with a plastic coating on the palm and fingers are classifiable in the tariff schedule as gloves, not as articles of plastics, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said in a Dec. 6 opinion.
The convenors of e-commerce negotiations at the World Trade Organization -- Australia, Japan and Singapore -- are hoping the talks can conclude in early 2024, the WTO said. Unveiling a negotiating road map during a recent meeting, the three countries said the remaining few weeks of 2023 will focus "on bridging the gaps on outstanding issues, such as e-payments, telecommunications and information and communication technology products that use cryptography." Participants in the talks have now "parked" the negotiating text on privacy, the WTO added, raising the number of "parked," or temporarily concluded, topics to 13. Remaining topics include the "scope, exceptions and legal architecture of the future agreement."
The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
CBP's failure to seek clarification from the Commerce Department on whether importer Vanguard Trading Co.'s surface products were subject to the antidumping duty order on quartz surface products from China as part of an AD evasion case was "arbitrary and capricious," Vanguard told the Court of International Trade in a Dec. 4 complaint (Vanguard Trading Co. v. United States, CIT # 23-00253).
Chinese exporter Ninestar Corp. moved at the Court of International Trade to unseal and unredact the administrative record in its case against the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force's (FLETF) decision to add the company to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List. Ninestar said that while the trade court's recent order mandating disclosure to Ninestar's counsel of the government's evidentiary record marked some progress, the company's counsel said they remain "hobbled" since they can't share these materials with their client (Ninestar Corp. v. United States, CIT # 23-00182).
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit judges Alan Lourie, Kara Stoll and Tiffany Cunningham questioned both the position of the government and affected domestic producers in a Dec. 5 oral argument on whether CBP properly denied payouts of interest assessed after liquidation, known as delinquency interest, on antidumping and countervailing duties under the Continued Dumping and Subsidy Offset Act of 2000 (Adee Honey Farms v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 22-2105) (Hilex Poly Co. v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 22-2106).
The World Trade Organization and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization on Dec. 1 agreed to increase cooperation on various issues related to food and agricultural trade and climate change, the WTO announced. Heads of both organizations -- WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and FAO Director-General Qu Dognyu -- signed a "framework memorandum of understanding" at the 28th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP28) to "facilitate the organizations' close cooperation in these areas."