US seizes oil tanker off coast of Venezuela

Washington: The United States says it has seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela amid mounting tensions with the government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

“We’ve just seized a tanker on the coast of Venezuela, a large tanker, very large, [the] largest one ever seized, actually,” President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House.

The USS Gravely, one of the American warships off the coast of Venezuela.Credit: AP

British maritime risk management group Vanguard said the tanker Skipper was believed to have been seized off Venezuela early on Wednesday. The US has imposed sanctions on the tanker for what Washington said was its involvement in Iranian oil trading when it was called the Adisa.

The seizure is the Trump administration’s latest push to increase pressure on Maduro, who has been charged with narcoterrorism in the United States. The US has conducted a series of deadly military strikes in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean on boats that it alleges are carrying drugs.

Trump said, “other things are happening”, but did not offer additional details, saying he would speak more about it later.

According to the ship tracking site Marine Traffic, the Skipper is 332.9 metres long and sails under the flag of Guyana. Positional data from two days ago showed it about 100 kilometres off the coast of Guyana, about 300 kilometres east of Venezuela.

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The operation was carried out by the US Coast Guard and supported by the Navy, according to a US official who was not authorised to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity. The official added that the seizure was conducted under US law enforcement authority.

Venezuela has the world’s largest proven oil reserves and produces about 1 million barrels a day. Locked out of global oil markets by US sanctions, the state-owned oil company sells most of its output at a steep discount to refiners in China.

The transactions usually involve a complex network of shadowy intermediaries as sanctions scared away more established traders. Many are shell companies, registered in jurisdictions known for secrecy. The buyers deploy “ghost tankers” that hide their location and hand off their valuable cargoes in the middle of the ocean before they reach their final destination.

A day earlier, the US military flew a pair of fighter jets over the Gulf of Venezuela in what appeared to be the closest that warplanes had come to the South American country’s airspace since the start of the administration’s pressure campaign.

The US has built up the largest military presence in the region in decades and launched a series of deadly strikes on alleged drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean.

Trump has said land attacks are coming soon, but has not offered any details on location.

Among the concessions the US has made to Maduro during past negotiations was approval for oil giant Chevron to resume pumping and exporting Venezuelan oil. The corporation’s activities in the South American country provided a financial lifeline to Maduro’s government.

Oil futures rose following news of the seizure. After trading in negative territory, Brent crude futures rose 27 cents, or 0.4%, to settle at $62.21 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures gained 21 cents, also 0.4%, to close at $58.46 per barrel.

AP, Reuters

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