I recently had an engaging conversation with Dr. Damien Romestant, an international expert in the areas of financial crime, anti corruption, compliance, economic sanctions and export controls. Our exchange was aired in November 2023 in the “Pencast” podcast series, part of the media / outreach function of PEN-CP (the Pan-European Network of Customs Practitioners), a EU Horizon 2020 funded Customs security practitioner project that aims to accelerate innovation in the Customs world.
Dr. Romestant earned his PhD in law from the University of Montpellier, France, with a thesis on the roles played by export controls and the international sanctions in the regulation of strategic goods and products. That thesis was later published as an important book, Commerce et Sécurité: Les Exportations Sensibles dans la Mondialisation (Commerce and Security: Sensitive Exports in Globalization)
Today Dr. Romestant wears many hats. He is the Head of Economic Sanctions for the Corporate Crime Observatory, in which capacity he spoke with me. He’s also the Global Lead Trade Compliance Counsel for CEVA Logistics, has consulted with private companies in the compliance space, has taken part in several important technical assistance programs for the EU and the UN, in locations including Romania, Senegal and Nigeria, which aimed at fighting corruption and terror financing, improving governance, and carrying out justice reform. He is also a founding member of Cercle K2, a French not for profit organization with members from over 30 nations that furthers nonpartisan international dialogue.
For more on Dr. Romestant's impressive activities and publications, visit his LinkedIn page -- and check out our podcast, during which we speak, among other things, about recent reports of suspicious imports and exports through Turkey, which seem to suggest sanctions evasion, and the recent surge in AI-driven weapons systems imported by Israel since the Gaza war.