The United States intends to seize several more ships carrying Venezuelan oil after the first seizure this week, Reuters and The Washington Post reported, citing sources.
Washington is seeking to increase pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, the publications reported. Meanwhile, Bloomberg reports that the seizure of the first tanker Skipper, announced by the US on December 10, is “just the beginning of a new phase in the Donald Trump administration's intensified campaign against Maduro“.
According to Reuters, the US has compiled a list of ships for possible seizure and is monitoring their movements off the coast of Venezuela and Guyana. Two sources said that the US Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security have been preparing the plan for several months and believe that reducing or stopping Venezuelan oil exports will create an additional financial burden on the government.
The agency's sources reported that in the coming weeks the United States intends to take additional measures against ships carrying oil not only from Venezuela but also from other sanctioned countries, such as Iran.
On Thursday, the US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on six supertankers that Washington says recently loaded Venezuelan oil. It is not known whether these ships are among the new US targets. Four Venezuelan citizens, including relatives of First Lady Celia Flores, were also subject to sanctions.
Caracas called the detention of Skipper a “flagrant robbery and an act of international piracy“ and promised to bring the matter to the attention of international organizations. Venezuelan authorities said that the incident “reveals the true motives“ of Washington's policy: “it is not about migration, human trafficking drugs or human rights, but for the desire to seize Venezuela's natural resources - its oil and energy.
According to Bloomberg, Maduro's inner circle is trying to prepare for the possibility that the United States will seize other sanctioned ships. The management of the state-owned company Petróleos de Venezuela SA is considering how to safely export oil to China, the main buyer of Venezuelan crude.
This week, Trump said that “Maduro's days are numbered“. The American leader again did not rule out the possibility of an invasion of Venezuela. The United States has amassed the largest concentration of troops in the region in decades on the country's coast.