US issues fresh sanctions targeting Maduro’s family, Venezuela-linked oil tankers
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Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro gestures during a rally in Caracas on Dec 10.
PHOTO: AFP
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- The US imposed sanctions on six shipping firms and tankers moving Venezuelan oil, aiming to increase pressure on Caracas and Maduro's ouster.
- Trump announced the US seized a sanctioned Venezuelan oil tanker, marking the first such action since sanctions began in 2019 and amid military build-up.
- "Narco nephews" Franqui Flores and Efrain Antonio Campo Flores, previously jailed for drug charges and released in 2022, also face sanctions.
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WASHINGTON - The United States on Dec 11 issued new sanctions targeting Venezuela, imposing curbs on three nephews of President Nicolas Maduro’s wife, as well as six crude oil tankers and shipping companies linked to them, as Washington ramps up pressure on Caracas.
The action came as the US executes a large-scale military buildup in the southern Caribbean and as US President Donald Trump campaigns for Mr Maduro’s ouster.
On Dec 10, Mr Trump said the US had seized a sanctioned oil tanker
The US Treasury Department, in a statement, said it imposed sanctions on six shipping companies moving Venezuelan oil, as well as six crude oil tankers linked to them.
Four of the tankers, including the 2002-built H. Constance and the 2003-built Lattafa, are Panama-flagged, with the other two flagged by the Cook Islands and Hong Kong.
The targeted vessels are supertankers that recently loaded crude in Venezuela, according to state oil company PDVSA’s internal shipping documents.
Mr Franqui Flores and Mr Efrain Antonio Campo Flores, nephews of Venezuelan first lady Cilia Flores, were also hit with sanctions. The two were dubbed the “narco nephews” after their arrest in Haiti in 2015 in a US Drug Enforcement Administration sting operation.
They were convicted in 2016 on charges that they tried to carry out a multimillion-dollar cocaine deal and sentenced to 18 years in prison, but were released in a 2022 prison swop with Venezuela.
The Venezuelan communications ministry, which handles press inquiries for the government, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Dec 10 seizure was the first of a Venezuelan oil cargo amid US sanctions that have been in force since 2019.
It is the Trump administration’s first known action against a Venezuela-related tanker since he ordered a massive military buildup
Mr Trump has repeatedly raised the possibility of military intervention in Venezuela, accusing it of sending narcotics to the US.
The US has already carried out more than 20 strikes
