Tuesday, March 9, 2021

Cleaning up Trump's mess - ongoing

People who were denied entry to the United States because of former President Donald Trump’s travel ban on 13 mostly Muslim-majority and African countries can seek new decisions or submit new applications, the US Department of State has said.

President Joe Biden overturned Trump’s so-called Muslim ban on January 20, his first day in office, calling it “a stain on our national conscience”.

  alJazeera
The United States on Monday revoked a sanctions waiver for Israeli mining magnate Dan Gertler that was issued in the last days of the Trump administration.

The Treasury Department said exempting Gertler from sanctions was “inconsistent with America’s strong foreign policy interests in combating corruption around the world,” specifically in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

[...]

The Treasury imposed the sanctions in December 2017 and June 2018, accusing Gertler of using his friendship with Democratic Republic of the Congo’s former president, Joseph Kabila, to win sweetheart mining deals worth more than a billion dollars.

The Trump administration eased the sanctions in a secret action in its last week in office in January, a licence granted by the Treasury Department showed.

While the licence did not remove Gertler, an associate and more than 30 of his companies from the sanctions list, it authorised, until January 31, 2022, “all transactions and activities” otherwise prohibited by sanctions against them.

The original designation of Gertler under the Magnitsky Sanctions programme made clear “Mr Gertler engaged in extensive public corruption,” the Treasury said in a statement on Monday.

The sanctions had prohibited Gertler from doing business with US citizens, companies or banks, effectively barring him from doing transactions in dollars.

  alJazeera
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

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