OFAC Lawsuit
Last spring, a law that forbids doing commerce with certain countries currently in disfavor with the administration was brought to bear on a publishing matter. At that time, the IEEE wanted to publish articles by scientists from embargoed countries and asked the Office of Foreign Assets Control at the Treasury Department whether doing so violated any laws. The OFAC’s response was yes. By the summer, the rules were somewhat relaxed, but still made it difficult for publishers to do their work. Now, Edward Wyatt reports in the NY Times about the latest developments.
Treasury Department regulations against editing manuscripts from Cuba, Iran and other countries under American economic sanctions violate the First Amendment of the Constitution and should be overturned, a group of American publishers said in a federal lawsuit filed yesterday.