By Jonathan Saul
LONDON, Jan 13 (Reuters) – The U.S. government has filed for court warrants to seize dozens more tankers linked to the Venezuelan oil trade, four sources familiar with the matter said, as Washington consolidates control of oil shipments in and out of the South American country.
The U.S. military and Coast Guard have seized five vessels in recent weeks in international waters that were either carrying Venezuelan oil or have done so in the past. The seizures were part of Washington’s campaign to force Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro out of power that culminated in U.S. forces capturing him on January 3.
Since then, the administration of President Donald Trump has said it plans to control Venezuela’s oil resources indefinitely as it seeks to rebuild the country’s dilapidated oil industry.
Trump imposed a blockade to prevent sanctioned tankers from shipping Venezuelan oil in December that brought exports close to a standstill. Shipments have resumed this week under U.S. supervision.
ACTIONS ENABLE CONFISCATIONS
The U.S. government has filed multiple civil forfeiture actions in district courts, primarily in Washington, D.C., enabling the seizure and confiscation of oil cargoes and ships that have been involved in the trade, the sources told Reuters. They declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter.
The exact number of seizure warrants the U.S. has filed for, and how many it has already received, is unclear, the sources said, because the filings and legal orders are not public. Dozens have been filed, they added.
The Department of Justice did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The vessels already intercepted were either under U.S. sanctions or part of a “shadow fleet” of unregulated ships that disguise their origins to move oil from key sanctioned producers Iran, Russia or Venezuela.
There are still many tankers at sea carrying Venezuelan crude to top buyer China, or that have previously done so. The U.S. has imposed sanctions on many of those vessels for facilitating oil trade with Venezuela or Iran.
SEIZURES PAUSED SINCE FRIDAY: SOURCES
There has been a pause in U.S. action to seize vessels since Friday, the sources said. Action could resume against vessels and cargoes not authorized by the U.S., they said.
The Department of Defense, together with other U.S. agencies, would “hunt down and interdict ALL dark fleet vessels transporting Venezuelan oil at the time and place of our choosing”, Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell said on Friday on X.
The United States has targeted both the vessels and the cargoes on them in recent seizures. That is an escalation from previous seizures of Iranian cargoes between 2020 and 2023, shipping industry sources said. In those earlier cases, U.S. law enforcers confiscated the oil cargo but not the vessel itself.
The Department of Justice was “monitoring several other vessels for similar enforcement action”, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said on social media on January 7, after the seizure of the Bella-1 tanker, which was empty of any cargo and the first time in recent memory that the U.S. military has seized a Russian-flagged vessel.
Russia, like Venezuela, relies on the shadow fleet to carry oil that is under sanctions.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry described the action as “the illegal use of force” by the U.S. military, adding that the application of U.S. sanctions was “without legal foundation.”
(Reporting by Jonathan Saul and Andrew Goudsward; Editing by Simon Webb and Rod Nickel)
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