President Donald Trump announced Tuesday night that the U.S. would be implementing a “TOTAL AND COMPLETE BLOCKADE OF ALL SANCTIONED OIL TANKERS going into, and out of, Venezuela.”
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In a post on Truth Social, Trump wrote, “The illegitimate Maduro Regime is using Oil from these stolen Oil Fields to finance themselves, Drug Terrorism, Human Trafficking, Murder, and Kidnapping. For the theft of our Assets, and many other reasons, including Terrorism, Drug Smuggling, and Human Trafficking, the Venezuelan Regime has been designated a FOREIGN TERRORIST ORGANIZATION.”
The announcement of the blockade follows the seizure last week of one such sanctioned oil tanker, part of the so-called “shadow fleet” of tankers used to transport black-market oil from sanctioned countries, which was carrying Venezuelan crude to Cuba. The ship had been sanctioned in 2022 by the U.S. government for carrying Iranian oil.
The blockade is another escalation in the Trump administration’s militarized maximum-pressure campaign against the Maduro regime. The U.S. has deployed a dozen warships, including a carrier strike group, and significant air assets to the Caribbean in a putative attempt to stop the flow of drugs from the country and to force out Maduro. Constricting the oil trade will seriously diminish the Venezuelan government’s revenue and with it Maduro’s ability to maintain his allies’ loyalty by the petroleum industry’s spoils.
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