This second tanker is not on a list of vessels sanctioned by the U.S., a source said.
Venezuela’s minister of the interior, Diosdado Cabello, condemned the operation in a Saturday post on Instagram.
“The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela denounces and rejects the theft and hijacking of a new private vessel transporting Venezuelan oil, as well as the forced disappearance of its crew, committed by military personnel of the United States of America in international waters,” Cabello said.
Saturday’s operation comes after the U.S. interdicted a large, sanctioned oil tanker known as the Skipper off the coast of Venezuela last week. The ship, previously identified by the Treasury Department as the Adisa, is an oil tanker tied to a sanctions-evading smuggling network that U.S. officials say moved Iranian oil to generate revenue for Hezbollah and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard.
It’s a blockade. Go fishing and the USA will kill you. Try to ship oil and the USA will steal it. From anyone else this would be called terrorism and piracy.
And blockades are universally considered an act of war
An opening up Belarus by removing sanction on potash, coupled with pirating venezuelan bitumen heavy crude is a direct attack on trade with Canada. Those are two key resources we export to the US. They are going to cut us off as their supplier in an effort to crush us economically.
Unless it done by the us or it’s allies.