Reuters published an exclusive on Thursday, March 28, that the US government warned and threatened oil trading houses and refineries around the world “to further reduce the dealings with Venezuela or face sanctions”, according to three sources familiar with the matter.
The move by Washington is to pressure the exit of the government of Nicolás Maduro from the Venezuelan executive, in support of the fabricated figure of Juan Guaidó and his “interim power”.
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Threats of sanctions against oil companies and refiners doing business with Venezuela have two dimensions:
- On the one hand, since Mike Pompeo got the post of Secretary of State, he and his team have been working to shape an international policy related to oil: as the journalist Thierry Meyssan explains , Washington no longer seeks to take over hydrocarbons, that you do not need, “but to determine who will have access to them for developme and who will not.” Venezuela would be disposed in the US plans as a stable provider of “alliances around objectives of economic growth based on the guarantee of access to energy sources”, in a relationship of continued dependence on the oil industry as intended by the “opening plan” of Guaidó. Within its plans, the US threats fit perfectly into the blockade of Venezuela (and Iran) in the oil markets, whose consequences translate into a slowdown in economic stability in the country.
- On the other, the warning concerns companies and states that have not stopped supplying the Venezuelan oil market in Eurasia, the Indian subcontinent and some European sectors. China and Russia, the largest trans-oceanic allies of Venezuela, continue to do business with the government of Nicolás Maduro. These are the main “global competitors” of the United States in terms of the global economy and the military sector. Venezuela, today, is at the center of the unipolar / multipolar conflict; Washington with its policy again marks the dividing line of “you are with us or you are with them”, and therefore there will be sanctioning consequences according to the positions and actions of each one.
In this way, the United States tries to exert its power to control the oil distribution channels via finance, while facing Russia and China in the geopolitical theater and press for a change of regime in Venezuela.
Translated by JRE/EF
