WASHINGTON: Over the alleged support of weapons and drone development programs in Pakistan and Iran, as well as other issues, including supporting Russia’s war effort in Ukraine, the United States added more than two dozen entities to a trade blacklist on Monday.
According to the Commerce Department, the 26 targets, most of which were in Pakistan, China, and the United Arab Emirates, were said to have broken export controls, been involved in “weapons programs of concern,” or gotten around US sanctions and export controls on Russia and Iran.
Their expansion to the supposed “element list” limits them from getting US things and advancements without government authorisation.
“We are cautious in shielding US public safety from troublemakers,” said Under Secretary of Trade for Industry and Security Alan Estevez in a proclamation.
“Our actions today send a message to malicious actors that if they violate our controls, they will pay a price,” he added. Internet surveillance firm Sandvine was removed from the US trade blacklist.
Nine Pakistani entities were added because they were acting as procurement agents and front companies for a Pakistan-based company that was added to the Entity List in 2014. According to a statement made on Monday by the Bureau of Industry and Security of the United States Department of Commerce, the remaining seven Pakistani entities were added to support Pakistan’s ballistic missile program.
Beginning around 2010, the gathering was said to have obtained US-beginning things by camouflaging their end clients.
Six elements in China were added to the rundown for supposedly procuring US-beginning things to help China’s tactical modernization or to help Iran’s weapons and robot programs, among different reasons.
Additionally, in order to evade sanctions imposed after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, three entities in the United Arab Emirates and one in Egypt were said to have acquired or attempted to acquire US components.
The US Business Division likewise eliminated Canada-based Sandvine from the substance list, after the organization made moves to “to address the abuse of innovation can subvert common liberties.”
According to the Commerce Department, the company had been added to the list in February 2024 “after its products were used to conduct mass web-monitoring and censorship and target human rights activists and dissidents, including by enabling the misuse of commercial spyware.”
The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority is one of the previous customers of Sandvine’s deep packet inspection technology, which examines and manages network traffic.
