The United States Treasury has finally clarified the guidelines for importing pre-sanctioned diamonds of Russian origin. According to the rules that were imposed earlier this year, almost no Russian diamonds bigger than 1 ct could be brought into the US after March 1, 2024. However, this ban didn’t fully account for those goods that had been acquired before this cutoff date and hadn’t reached the US customs by the beginning of March.
This lack of legislative guidelines was addressed by License #103. As of August 23, 2024, when this regulation was put in place, the US government allowed the import of pre-sanctioned Russian jewelry that had been outside the territory of the Russian Federation before March 1 of this year.
Another License, #104, which was adopted several days ago, stipulates that any non-industrial diamonds bigger than 1 ct that were outside Russia as of March 1, could be legally imported to the US. This has been good news for many jewelry companies, in particular, those that had purchased rough Russian diamonds and sent them for polishing to India before the cutoff date. As for the smaller specimens, those that are between 0.5 and one carat will remain importable until September 1, 2024. Thus, the start of September marks the cutoff date for smaller pre-sanctioned diamonds.
The legislation does not specify certain important details, for example, whether or not the importers would have to show proof that the diamonds were outside the territory of Russia during the given dates and what kind of documents would they need as proof. However, most of the points that remained unclear in the initial regulations have been elucidated by the present licenses issued by the US Treasury’s OFAC on August 23. They provide specific guidelines on both loose and rough stones, as well as jewelry featuring diamonds of Russian origin. What’s more important, the rules are now clear on the importability of goods that were subjected to “significant transformation” outside the Russian Federation. For further details, please consult the official general licenses issued by the OFAC.
