US Treasury Department authorizes some transactions with Russia
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The US Treasury Department lifts sanctions against Gazprom Germania and allows transactions with Russia related to fertilizers, seeds, and food crops.
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US Treasury Department (Archive)
The United States is authorizing transactions with German energy conglomerate SEFE Securing Energy for Europe GmbH through December 16, 2022, despite sanctions imposed on Russia over the war in Ukraine, the US Treasury Department announced on Thursday.
"Except as provided in paragraph (b) of this general license, all transactions involving SEFE Securing Energy for Europe GmbH (formerly known as Gazprom Germania GmbH), or any entity in which SEFE Securing Energy for Europe GmbH owns, directly or indirectly, a 50 percent or greater interest, that are prohibited … are authorized through 12:01 a.m. eastern standard time, December 16, 2022," the Treasury Department said in a general license.
The US Department noted that the license does not authorize transactions otherwise prohibited by the "Russian Harmful Foreign Activities Sanctions Regulations."
It is noteworthy that on April 1, Russia's giant Gazprom suspended its participation in the German company Gazprom Germania and all of its assets.
On April 4, the German authorities seized Gazprom Germania, a German subsidiary of Russian Gazprom, and announced that it had been transferred to the custody of the German Federal Network Agency.
US authorizes transactions with Russia related to fertilizers, seeds, crops
In the same unit, the Department said that the US has issued a general license authorizing transactions with Russia related to fertilizers, seeds, and food crops.
"For the purposes of this general license, agricultural commodities, medicine, and medical devices are defined as follows: Agricultural commodities. [They] are intended for use as: Food for humans (including raw, processed, and packaged foods; live animals; vitamins and minerals; food additives or supplements; and bottled drinking water) or animals (including animal feeds); Seeds for food crops; Fertilizers or organic fertilizers; or Reproductive materials (such as live animals, fertilized eggs, embryos, and semen) for the production of food animals," the statement explained.
On his part, the President of the African Union and President of Senegal, Macky Sall, announced last June that the anti-Russian sanctions have deprived African countries of access to grain and fertilizer, calling on the West to ease sanctions on Russia to facilitate the export of grain to Africa.
In early June, UN chief Antonio Guterres said that fertilizer prices had more than doubled. He warned that the world faced shortages of all staple crops next year and urged to bring Russian crops and fertilizers back into world markets despite the conflict.
Last May, the United Nations called for not restricting the access of Russian fertilizers to the global market, in light of the sanctions imposed by several countries on Russia.
The German press had reported warnings that the world was threatened with starvation in 2023 as a result of Western sanctions affecting agricultural fertilizer factories in Russia and Belarus.
