The Biden administration took actions on January 26, 2021 to suspend the Trump administration’s recent sanctions against the Houthi rebel group in Yemen. This decision was followed closely by the Biden administration’s pause of pending arms sales to Saudi Arabia worth billions of dollars. The two actions may be early-stage indicators of President Biden’s foreign policy goals in the Gulf region and show a concern for both the humanitarian crisis in Yemen and the U.S.’s support of Saudi military operations.

On December 30, 2020 the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) filed a civil forfeiture complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. The DOJ is alleging that commercial real estate, located at 55 Public Square in Cleveland, Ohio, was acquired using misappropriated funds from PivatBank in Ukraine.  

In December 2020, approximately one month before the assault on the U.S. capitol, Laurent B., a French national, transferred the equivalent of € 400,000 to alt-right groups in the United States, illustrating the transnational component of U.S. domestic terrorism.[1]

On November 20, 2021, the Mexican government exonerated its former defense secretary Salvador Cienfuegos of United States corruption charges after enacting legislation pausing law enforcement cooperation with the U.S.

The Seoul Central District Court ordered Japan’s government to pay reparations to the families of 12 women forced to work as sex slaves, also called “comfort women,” during Japan’s colonization of Korea. It is estimated that tens of thousands of women, many from South Korea, were forced into sex slavery by Japanese soldiers and officials between 1910 and 1945. The court ordered the Japanese government to pay reparations worth 100 million won (roughly $91, 300 USD) each to the families of 12 women forced into sex slavery. Only five of the women are still alive today. The Seoul Central District Court called the forced sexual slavery of the women by Japan's military during the war "a crime against humanity."[1]

On December 2, 2020, the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs voted with 27 States in favor, 25 against, and one abstaining, to remove cannabis from its list of Schedule IV narcotic drugs.  Cannabis has been listed as a Schedule IV drug for sixty years under the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs of 1961.

On January 11, 2021, U.S. Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo announced that the Trump Administration has designated Cuba as a State Sponsor of Terrorism “for repeatedly providing support for acts of international terrorism in granting safe harbor to terrorists.”[1]

On January 6, 2021, two Canadian nationals arrived in North Dakota to face charges concerning the alleged trafficking of fentanyl.[1]

FinCEN is moving rapidly for reporting crypto currency and assets in two regulatory projects. FinCEN will require reporting of virtual currency held in a foreign account. In addition, FinCEN will require reports, recordkeeping, and verification of the identity of customers in relation to transactions involving convertible virtual currency (“CVC”) or digital assets with legal tender status (“legal tender digital assets” or “LTDA”) held in unhosted wallets  or held in wallets hosted in a jurisdiction identified by FinCEN.

On January 8, 2021, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft (Deutsche Bank) agreed to pay more than $130 million to settle the government’s investigation into violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and a separate investigation into a commodities fraud scheme.[1]