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The U.S. intercepted the oil tanker Bella-1, flying the Panamanian flag, in international waters near Venezuela, the third one in recent days.
According to a government source confirmed to Bloomberg, the ship was heading to Venezuela.
The Bella-1, linked to the company Louis Marine Shipholding Enterprises, which is in turn associated with the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, has been under sanctions since June 2024 by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of the U.S. Treasury.
This would be the third seizure of an oil tanker near Venezuela in recent weeks and comes amid a significant U.S. military buildup in the region.
On Saturday, the U.S. government declassified images of the seizure of the second oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela.
"In an action before dawn this morning, December 20, the U.S. Coast Guard, with the support of the Department of Defense, detained a tanker that was last docked in Venezuela," said Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem on X.
"The United States will continue to pursue the illegal trafficking of authorized oil that is used to finance narco-terrorism in the region. We will find them and stop them," he added.
In the context of crude oil transportation, Reuters explained that although many ships picking up oil in Venezuela are sanctioned, there are others— including some transporting oil linked to Iran or Russia—that are not. It mentioned that companies such as the American Chevron transport Venezuelan oil on their own "authorized" vessels.
The first of the vessels seized last week, with a capacity exceeding 320,000 tons of crude oil, was transporting oil destined for Cuba and was part of an illegal network that was moving sanctioned crude from Venezuela and Iran.
The report also indicates that China is the largest buyer of Venezuelan crude oil and cites analysts' estimates regarding the volume of shipments in December.
The U.S. imposed energy sanctions on Venezuela in 2019, and buyers and refiners have turned to a "ghost fleet" or "shadow fleet" of tankers that mask their location, which is considered vulnerable to possible punitive measures from Washington.
Finally, the report frames the measure as part of a pressure campaign by Trump against Nicolás Maduro, which would include a greater military presence and actions against vessels near Venezuela; it also mentions that Maduro has claimed the U.S. deployment aims to overthrow him and seize control of the country's oil resources.
The President of the United States, Donald Trump, announced last Tuesday a total oil blockade against Venezuela and a tightening of deportations, in a message posted on his social media platform Truth Social, where he directly accused Nicolás Maduro's regime of financing criminal activities with energy resources.
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