WASHINGTON: Donald Trump said on Monday that the US will keep or sell the crude oil contained on tankers it had seized off the coast of Venezuela, as well as the vessels themselves.
He also said it would be “smart” for Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to step down, as US naval forces pressed a blockade on the South American country’s oil wealth.
Venezuela’s key ally, Moscow, however, expressed its “full support” for Maduro’s government, as Washington has dialed up military operations and threats against Caracas.
Asked by reporters at his Florida home if Washington’s threats were designed to force Maduro to leave office after 12 years, Trump said: “That’s up to him, what he wants to do. I think it would be smart for him to do that.”
But he added: “If he wants to do something — if he plays tough, it’ll be the last time he’s ever able to play tough.” Firing back just hours later, Maduro said that Trump would be “better off” if he focused on domestic problems rather than threatening Caracas.
“He would be better off in his own country on economic and social issues, and he would be better off in the world if he took care of his country’s affairs,” Maduro said in a speech broadcast on public television.
The pledge from Moscow, which is embroiled in the war in Ukraine, came on the eve of a UN Security Council meeting on Tuesday to discuss the mounting crisis.
In a phone call, the foreign ministers of the allied nations blasted the US actions, which have included strikes on alleged drug-trafficking boats and the seizure of two oil tankers.
A third ship was being pursued, a US official said on Sunday.
Low-profile vessel
“The ministers expressed their deep concern over the escalation of Washington’s actions in the Caribbean Sea, which could have serious consequences for the region and threaten international shipping,” the Russian foreign ministry said of the call between Sergei Lavrov and Venezuelan counterpart Yvan Gil.
“The Russian side reaffirmed its full support for and solidarity with the Venezuelan leadership and people in the current context,” it added in a statement.
US forces have since September launched strikes on boats that Washington claims, without providing evidence, were trafficking drugs in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean.
More than 100 people have been killed — some of them fishermen, according to their families and governments.
The latest strike hit a “low-profile vessel” in the eastern Pacific Ocean, killing one occupant, the US military said on Monday.
Last week, Trump also announced a blockade of “sanctioned oil vessels” sailing to and from Venezuela.
Trump claims Caracas is using oil money to finance “drug terrorism, human trafficking, murder, and kidnapping.”
Caracas, in turn, fears Washington is seeking regime change, and has accused Washington of “international piracy.”
Moscow’s statement said Lavrov and Gil agreed in their call to “coordinate their actions on the international stage, particularly at the UN.” Russia and China, another Venezuela ally, backed Caracas’s request for a UNSC meeting to discuss what it called “the ongoing US aggression.”
Russia’s ‘hands full’
On Telegram, Venezuela’s Gil said he and Lavrov had discussed “the aggressions and flagrant violations of international law being perpetrated in the Caribbean: attacks on vessels, extrajudicial executions, and illicit acts of piracy carried out by the United States government.”
Gil said Lavrov had affirmed Moscow’s “full support in the face of hostilities against our country.” Last week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio brushed aside Moscow’s stated support for Caracas.
Washington, he said, was “not concerned about an escalation with Russia with regards to Venezuela” as “they have their hands full in Ukraine.”
US-Russia relations have soured in recent weeks as Trump has voiced frustration with Moscow over the lack of a resolution to the Ukraine war.
