International Transactions
General Information
The U.S. Department of Treasury, Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) regulations prohibit the university from conducting any financial transaction or providing services to any blocked or sanctioned country, individual, entity or organization, including a government agency of a sanctioned country. University personnel who engage in activities like financial transactions, service agreements and contracts with individuals or entities outside of the U.S. are responsible for ensuring compliance with U.S. export control laws.
UTEP employees either conduct or submit a restricted party screening to the Office of Research Compliance & Regulatory Assurances prior to doing business with an entity or individual. The screening is a compliance control that prevents doing business with or providing services of any kind to individuals or entities contained in U.S. government restricted, denied, debarred, designated, or blocked persons lists.
If, during travel, you are contacted by an individual or entity that wants to engage in business or have you provide other services, please contact ORCRA to conduct a restricted party screening to evaluate whether the transaction can occur.
University employees can submit the Export Control Related Activity Assessment Request form in order to initiate this process.
Additional Tips
- OFAC administers and enforces economic and trade sanctions.
- OFAC enforces trade, anti-terrorism, narcotics, human rights, and other national security and foreign policy-based sanctions prohibiting the provision of anything of value, either tangible or intangible, to sanctioned countries, organizations, or individuals.
- The pertinent regulations provide OFAC with broad authority to block or interdict vaguely defined “prohibited transactions” involving restricted destinations or parties. A complete list of Sanctions Programs and Country Information can be found in the U.S. Department of Treasury online Resource Center.