[Sigifp-l] FW: [ALA-WO:78] Editing Embargo Lifted

[Shelly Warwick]

This might be of interest.


Shelly Warwick
Assistant Professor
Graduate School of Library and Information Studies
Queens College
BRL-254
65-30 Kissena Boulevard
Flushing, NY 11367
Voice: 718-997-3757
Fax: 718-997-3797
Shelly_Warwick at qc.edu

> ALAWON: American Library Association Washington Office Newsline
> Volume 13, Number 105
> December 16, 2004
>
> In This Issue: EDITING EMBARGO LIFTED
>
> The Washington Office has been monitoring the issue of U.S. Treasury
> Department rules, through the Office of Foreign Assets Control, known as
> OFAC, that prohibit transactions with the governments of Cuba, Iran, and
> Sudan. In a ruling on Wednesday, 15 December, the Department said that
> trade embargoes do not restrict publishing, so U.S. persons (citizens
> and registered aliens) do not have to apply for a license if they wish
> to edit or publish works by authors in Cuba, Iran, or Sudan. Violators
> of the trade embargo face fines of up to $1-million and jail terms of as
> much as 10 years. The new rule enables U.S. persons to freely engage in
> most ordinary publishing activities with persons in Cuba, Iran and
> Sudan, while maintaining restrictions on certain interactions with the
> governments, government officials, and people acting on behalf of the
> governments of those countries.
>
> Congress had exempted "information or informational materials" from
> trade embargoes in 1988. Until Wednesday's ruling, however, OFAC had
> exempted only informational materials that were "fully created" by
> people in embargoed countries and that had not been substantially
> altered, including by editing, in the United States. In order to edit
> informational materials from authors in embargoed countries, U.S.
> persons were required file requests for licenses. 
>
> In September, a suit asking for an immediate injunction against
> enforcement of the regulations was filed by the Association of American
> Publishers' Professional and Scholarly Publishing Division, the
> Association of American University Presses, the PEN American Center, and
> Arcade Publishing. The plaintiffs were joined by Shirin Ebadi, the
> Iranian lawyer and human-rights activist who sought to publish her
> memoirs in the United States.
>
> A copy of the rule submitted to the Federal Register
> http://www.treas.gov/press/releases/reports/office foreign.pdf
>
>
>
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