Wednesday, July 15, 2020

The President’s Executive Order on Hong Kong Normalization

On July 14, 2020, the President of the United States of America, signed an Executive Order determining, pursuant to section 202 of the United States-Hong Kong Policy Act of 1992, that the Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong (Hong Kong) is no longer sufficiently autonomous to justify differential treatment in relation to the People's Republic of China.

The Order suspends the application of section 201(a) of the United States-Hong Kong Policy Act of 1992, as amended (22 U.S.C. 5721(a)), which is the provision in U.S. law that treats Hong Kong as separate from China as regards the application of certain laws. Specifically the Order list the following statutes:

(a) section 103 of the Immigration Act of 1990 (8 U.S.C. 1152 note);

(b) sections 203(c), 212(l), and 221(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, as amended (8 U.S.C. 1153(c), 1182(l), and 1201(c), respectively);

(c) the Arms Export Control Act (22 U.S.C. 2751 et seq.);

(d) section 721(m) of the Defense Production Act of 1950, as amended (50 U.S.C. 4565(m));

(e) the Export Control Reform Act of 2018 (50 U.S.C. 4801 et seq.); and

(f) section 1304 of title 19, United States Code. This law relates to the country of origin labeling of imported merchandise and could be disruptive for companies that relocated manufacturing from China to Hong Kong to avoid additional tariffs under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, as Agathon Associates reported in August 2019.

No comments:

Post a Comment