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Happy Friday!  It’s April 26, and we’re tracking top stories to take you into the weekend: Foreign aid package comes with new sanctions risks for companies, Princeton anti-Israel activists coordinate between campus radicals and outside groups, mother of corruption in Venezuela, Chinese nationals arrested for smuggling silicon chips, and much more...

Catch up on all the news any time at Illicit Edge!

Featured Story

🎯 Foreign Aid Package Comes With New Sanctions Risks for Companies. Prosecutors now have 10 years to investigate sanctions violations, and banks will be required to flag suspicious transactions that could be tied to fentanyl trafficking. WSJ  

Top Stories

🌎 Notes from Princeton Activists Show Coordination Between Campus Radicals and Outside Groups Aimed at Outfoxing University Administrators. Columbia University protesters are training and coordinating with their peers around the country. Free Beacon

🌎 Oil: 'Mother of corruption' in Venezuela. Corruption in Venezuela's oil industry is a many-headed monster that has devoured billions of dollars in taxpayers' money in the past 20 years. AFP

🌎 Chinese Nationals Arrested in U.S for Scheme to Illegally Export Semiconductor Manufacturing Machine. The duo attempted to bypass export restrictions by using intermediaries to disguise the true end user, a blacklisted Chinese company. DOJ

🚩 US wants allies to cut chip-related China exports amid Huawei alarm FT

🌎 UK, US and Canada impose more sanctions on Iran after Israel attack. In a coordinated announcement, the countries targeted Iran's drone and missile industries by hitting key individuals and companies. Politico

🌎 Construction boss accused of bribing Russian minister as scandal widens. Alexander Fomin suspected of paying bribes to Deputy Defense Minister Timur Ivanov. NBC

🌎 Turncoat warlord at center of Myanmar drama. Army headed by Saw Chit Thu said to earn $190M a year from Myawaddy gambling and crime hub Reuters

🌎 FBI warns Americans against using unregistered crypto money transmitting services. Authorities included an official tool from FinCEN to let users look up if a company is registered as an MSB. Block

🌎 Health insurance giant Kaiser will notify millions of a data breach after sharing patients’ data with advertisers. Kaiser is the latest healthcare organization to confirm it shared patients’ personal information with third-party advertisers by way of online tracking code. TechCrunch

🌎 A Chinese Firm Is America’s Favorite Drone Maker. Except in Washington. U.S. authorities consider DJI a security threat while it dominates the commercial and consumer drone markets. NYT 

🌎 How North Korea’s Man in the West Ran Afoul of US Authorities. Alejandro Cao de Benós has been accused of violating sanctions in connection with a 2019 cryptocurrency conference. Bloomberg

IN THE NEWS

Russia

🇷🇺 Russia embraces K-pop and anime as sanctions limit Western entertainment Semafor

🇷🇺 Russia Asset Seizure Law Spurs Yellen Praise, Dollar Angst Bloomberg

🇷🇺 Pro-Kremlin oligarch's impounded yacht is being auctioned off to Ukraine BI

🇷🇺 Russia sanctions-busting? Big questions remain over UK car exports Sky

🇷🇺 EU Weighs Sanctions on Russian LNG Projects, Transshipments Bloomberg

🇷🇺 US and Russia are vying to build Ghana’s nuclear energy plant Semafor

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China

🇨🇳 Huawei’s New Phone Sports Latest Version of Made-in-China Chip Bloomberg

🇨🇳 Huawei-led Chinese firms aim to make advanced memory chips by 2026 Reuters

🇨🇳 China harbors ship transporting North Korean munitions to Russia Telegraph

🇨🇳 States Take On China in the Name of National Security WSJ

🇨🇳 ByteDance prefers TikTok shutdown in US if legal options fail Reuters

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Corruption & Financial Crime

💸 ICC’s vicious smear tactics against America’s allies NYP

💸 Could NFL see next Saudi sportswashing controversy? Awful Announcing

💸 Vietnam soft drinks boss jailed for 8 years RFA

💸 Malaysia ex-PM Mahathir under investigation as probe widens SCMP

💸 South Africa Sends Top Officials to UAE Over Gupta Extraditions Bloomberg

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Crypto & Cyber

🔐 Samourai Wallet Charges Raise Existential Questions for Privacy Tech CoinDesk

🔐 UK Law Enforcement Agencies Can Now Seize Crypto More Easily CoinDesk

🔐 Millions of IPs remain infected by USB worm years after its creators left it for dead Ars

🔐 North Korean Lazarus hacker group using LinkedIn to target and steal assets Cointelegraph

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Trafficking

🚚 What George Kelly’s Mistrial Says About How We See the Border New Yorker

🚚 DR Congo demands answers from Apple over ‘blood mineral’ supply chain concerns Semafor

🚚 Georgians arrested over cross-Europe thefts of rare library books Guardian

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