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WASHINGTON: The United States on Wednesday imposed sanctions on five Iranian ship captains who delivered oil to Venezuela, and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo reaffirmed Washington’s backing for Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido.
Speaking at a press conference at the State Department, Pompeo said the ships delivered around 1.5 million barrels of Iranian gasoline and related components, and warned mariners against doing business with the government of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, whose ouster Washington wants.
“As a result of today’s sanctions, these captains’ assets will be blocked. Their careers and prospects will suffer from this designation,” Pompeo said in a statement later.
US President Donald Trump’s administration is seeking to block Iran’s energy trade and also to bring down Maduro. It has threatened reprisals and warned ports, shipping companies and insurers against facilitating the tankers.
Venezuela’s exports are hovering near their lowest levels in more than 70 years and the OPEC member’s economy has collapsed. Yet Maduro has held on, frustrating the Trump administration.
In a statement posted on Twitter, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza called the sanctions on the captains “an excess of arrogance” and “more proof of the Trump hawks’ hatred of all Venezuelans.”
Iran has since April sent five tankers totaling about 1.5 million barrels to the leftist government of fuel-starved Venezuela. The shipments have done little to alleviate hours-long lines at gas stations.
In an interview with news site Axios published on Sunday, Trump played down his January 2019 decision to recognize Guaido, speaker of the opposition-held National Assembly, as Venezuela’s rightful leader. Trump has been frustrated by the inability of his recognition of Guaido and his sanctions campaign to oust Maduro, some US officials have said privately.
The White House said on Monday that Trump had not lost confidence in Guaido.