Foreign and Commonwealth Office

My noble Friend the Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon) has made the following written ministerial statement:

Today the “Report on Regulations Made under Section 32 of the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018” will be laid in Parliament.

The report details the two regulations laid under section 1 of the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018 during the reporting period from 23 May 2019 to 22 May 2020, and states the relevant human rights purposes of those regulations.

In addition to the actions set out in the report, the Government established the global human rights sanctions regime on 6 July by laying regulations in Parliament. These regulations enable the Government to impose sanctions in response to serious human rights violations or abuses around the world. The Government made immediate use of the powers provided by the Global Human Rights Sanctions Regulations 2020, implementing 49 designations on a range of people and entities.

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The Government are pleased to announce that we have moved into formal negotiations on our future relationships with both the EEA EFTA states (Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway) and Switzerland from the beginning of July.

The Government have already been working closely with all four non-EU states on a range of issues related to our future relationship. We have successfully delivered a number of agreements, including the EEA EFTA separation agreement signed in January this year, which broadly mirrors provisions in the EU withdrawal agreement on citizens’ rights and a small number of other relevant separation issues. With the Swiss, we have concluded and signed agreements in five key areas; trade; air services; road transport; insurance; and citizen’s rights.

The EEA EFTA states and Switzerland are important European economic partners, with bilateral trade totalling approximately £27 billion with the EEA EFTA states and around £39 billion with Switzerland in 2019. We also enjoy close co-operation with these countries across a range of areas outside of trade, which is why the Government are seeking to agree measures that span across the entire breadth of our relationship.

Negotiations with the EEA EFTA states will continue to take place alongside those we are conducting with the EU. In some areas, our future relationship with these states will be closely tied to the UK’s future relationship with the EU by virtue of their participation in the EU single market, via the EEA agreement, and other EU-led initiatives. In others, these countries have the flexibility to agree bespoke bilateral arrangements. The ongoing negotiations will need to take account of this, but we are clear in our aim of protecting the close levels of existing co-operation we have we these key European partners, and building ambitious future facing agreements befitting our close relationship with them.