UKCG Files Complaint In Antidumping Circumvention Case

WASHINGTON, Aug. 24, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- On July 31, 2012, the U.S. Department of Commerce issued its final determination regarding circumvention of the antidumping duty order on Small Diameter Graphite Electrodes from China. This decision follows the preliminary determination issued on May 30, 2012. In the final determination, the Commerce Department upheld most of the findings that it had made in the preliminary determination and found that small diameter electrodes produced in the UKCG plant in England are considered to be "Chinese" for the purpose of the dumping case. According to Jeffrey Neeley, a partner in Barnes, Richardson & Colburn, who represented UKCG before the agency, "This determination is in direct contradiction to the ruling of the authorities of the United Kingdom, who examined the same imports of inputs from China and the transformation of the product in England, and concluded that the electrodes must be labeled as product of the United Kingdom." According to Neeley, under almost identical circumstances and under U.S. customs law, U.S. Customs and Border Protection Authorities reached the same conclusion as the UK authorities. In addition, UKCG had pointed out to Commerce that the Petitioners in this case had specifically excluded the very same type of rods imported into the U.K. from the scope of the case. Despite these facts and argument, Commerce found in favor of the domestic industry.

After reviewing its options with its lawyers and with the support of The British Government ( BIS ) and the European Commission ( DG Trade), UKCG filed suit in the U.S. Court of International Trade in New York on August 15 and followed up with a more detailed complaint on August 23. Keith McGhee, UKCG's Managing Director said: "We think that there are unique facts in this case regarding Petitioners' limiting the scope of the case that the Department of Commerce did not analyze correctly. We also think that it made some serious errors of law."

Jeffrey Neeley, UKCG's lawyer, stated: "UKCG has challenged the Commerce decision in five counts. The challenges include an argument that the rods were excluded by Petitioners at the outset of this case and cannot now be brought into the order, the unlawful use of surrogate values in an anti-circumvention review, the misuse of the term 'value' by Commerce, and the wrongful application of Chinese deposit rates to a U.K company." Mr. McGhee added: "We are confident that when a judge reviews everything in this case it will be clear that we are producing products in the U.K. that are outside the scope of the order and are in no way circumventing the U.S. dumping order. We will continue to fight all such unwarranted actions by our competitors."