{"id":494909,"date":"2025-12-17T20:48:38","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T00:48:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.net\/en\/uncategorized\/sanctioned-oil-tankers-move-away-from-venezuela-after-donald-trumps-announcement-of-a-total-blockade\/"},"modified":"2025-12-17T20:48:38","modified_gmt":"2025-12-18T00:48:38","slug":"sanctioned-oil-tankers-move-away-from-venezuela-after-donald-trumps-announcement-of-a-total-blockade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/international\/sanctioned-oil-tankers-move-away-from-venezuela-after-donald-trumps-announcement-of-a-total-blockade\/","title":{"rendered":"Sanctioned oil tankers move away from Venezuela after Donald Trump’s announcement of a “total blockade”"},"content":{"rendered":"Several oil tankers have begun to divert from Venezuela<\/strong>\u00a0after the President of the United States,\u00a0Donald Trump<\/strong><\/a>, threatened to impose a \u201ctotal and absolute blockade\u201d on sanctioned vessels entering or leaving the South American country. The warning marks an escalation in the White House’s pressure strategy against the Nicol\u00e1s Maduro regime.\n\nTrump said on Tuesday that he had ordered a blockade on sanctioned oil tankers linked to Venezuela<\/strong>, a formulation that, if applied, could suffocate one of the country’s main sources of income with the largest proven crude oil reserves in the world. However, the exact scope of the threat has not been officially clarified by the US Administration.\n\n\n

You may be interested in:<\/strong> http:\/\/Congreso brasile\u00f1o aprueba el proyecto que busca reducir la pena de Bolsonaro<\/a><\/p>\n\n\nDuring his first term,  the United States imposed sanctions that prohibit U.S. companies and citizens from buying Venezuelan oil<\/strong> without specific authorization from the Treasury Department. This regime is compounded by measures against hundreds of vessels that make up what authorities and analysts describe as a \u201cghost fleet<\/a>\u201d, used to transport crude oil from countries under sanctions such as Iran, Russia, and Venezuela.\n\nAccording to maritime intelligence firm Windward, at least 30 sanctioned vessels are currently operating in the vicinity of Venezuelan waters<\/strong>. Some of them have begun to change course or alter navigation patterns, in apparent response to the risk of seizures or new sanctions.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s pretty clear this has disrupted energy flows to and from Venezuela<\/strong>,\u201d noted Michelle Wiese Bockmann, an analyst at Windward. \u201cEvery hour we track these vessels we see oil tankers diverting, loitering or changing their behavior,\u201d she added.\n\nOne of the most visible cases is that of the Hyperion ship, which was heading to the Venezuelan port of Jos\u00e9, one of the main crude oil export centers in the country. In the early hours of Wednesday, the ship made a 90-degree turn and headed north<\/strong>, moving away from South America, according to maritime tracking data.\n\nThe Hyperion was formerly part of the Russian state-owned transport fleet<\/strong> and is among the 173 vessels sanctioned during the final days of Joe Biden’s presidency for allegedly facilitating exports of Russian oil in violation of sanctions imposed on Moscow following the invasion of Ukraine.\n\n\n

Following those sanctions, the vessel changed its flag from Comoros to Gambia. However, in November, the authorities of that African country removed the Hyperion and dozens of other ships from its maritime registry<\/strong>, privately managed, for the alleged use of false certificates claiming to have been issued by the Gambian maritime authority.<\/p>\n\n\nThe ownership structure of the vessel remains opaque and fragmented into multiple layers of shell companies, some registered in Dubai<\/strong>, in the United Arab Emirates, a common pattern in the fleet used to evade international sanctions.\n\nThat framework, according to industry experts, increases the legal vulnerability of the vessels. “It is evident that it is in a position to be seized<\/strong>,” warned Wiese Bockmann, referring to the Hyperion, in a context of increasing surveillance by US authorities.\n\nTrump’s threat comes a few days after the seizure of the Skipper vessel<\/strong> by US forces near Venezuela, an episode that has heightened fear among maritime operators and insurers. Although Washington has not yet detailed the specific mechanisms of a possible “blockade”, the mere announcement has been enough to disrupt oil traffic.\n\nFor Venezuela, which heavily relies on crude oil exports to sustain its economy, any prolonged disruption in maritime routes adds pressure to a sector already weakened by years of sanctions, lack of investment, and infrastructure deterioration<\/strong>. The movement of ships suggests that, even without formal definitions, the perceived risk is having immediate effects on the country’s energy trade.","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Several oil tankers have begun to divert from Venezuela\u00a0after the President of the United States,\u00a0Donald Trump, threatened to impose a \u201ctotal and absolute blockade\u201d on sanctioned vessels entering or leaving the South American country. The warning marks an escalation in the White House’s pressure strategy against the Nicol\u00e1s Maduro regime. Trump said on Tuesday that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":494910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[95],"tags":[15925,110],"class_list":["post-494909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-international","tag-donald-trump","tag-venezuela"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/phj1q1-24Kp","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/12\/SQDE7642M5A6XDDV5BBYVZX2E4.avif","dum_api":{"author_name":"Redacci\u00f3n De \u00daltimo Minuto","author_image":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/cropped-logo-de-ultimo-minuto-96x96.png","categories_name":["International"],"featured_media_url":"https:\/\/cdn.deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/12\/SQDE7642M5A6XDDV5BBYVZX2E4.avif"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=494909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/494910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=494909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=494909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deultimominuto.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=494909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}