White Collar & Government Investigations Blog

Not so long ago, foreign corruption prosecutions was the cause celebre of the U.S. Department of Justice (“DOJ”), with the DOJ quadrupling its staff and sharply increasing the number of FBI agents focused on the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”) investigations and prosecutions over a more than 10 year period beginning in or about 2010.  Numerous foreign and domestic individuals and companies were ultimately charged with violating this extraterritorial law, including individuals from Brazil (in Operation Lava Jato ), Norway, Africa and throughout Asia.  However, since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the FCPA has no longer been the primary foreign focus for cross border enforcement and has given way to an emphasis on foreign sanctions under the Department of the Treasury, Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), most particularly the Russian Harmful Foreign Activities Sanctions issued under Executive Order 14024 and others beginning on February 23, 2022 and beyond. Since then, numerous blocked persons (“SDNs”) have been added to OFAC’s sanctions list on a frequent basis. Most recently, on June 12, 2024 and again on July 3, 2024, the Treasury and State Departments, through OFAC, together with the US Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry & Security (“BIS”) have doubled down on Russian sanctions, issuing fresh rounds of sanctions seeking to weaken the Russian “war time economy” and choke off the Russian financial system from the rest of the world, through clamping down further on Foreign Financial Institutions (“FFIs”) and on Information Technology (“IT”), sensitive technology and transportation.