U.S. targets more oil tankers near Venezuela
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Gold and silver prices jumped to fresh highs in early trading amid heightened geopolitical tensions, as the U.S. pursued another tanker transporting oil from Venezuela.Despite record price levels. there are good prospects for gold to soar even higher in 2026 because holdings by central banks are way above historical levels,
President Donald Trump is gathering with top national security officials on Monday, a meeting that comes as the U.S. Coast Guard steps up efforts to interdict oil tankers in the Caribbean Sea as part of the Republican administration's escalating pressure campaign on Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro's government.
A Venezuela-bound vessel fled after rebuffing an attempt by the Coast Guard to seize it, the latest twist in the escalating U.S. pressure campaign against the Maduro government.
Under international law, Venezuela has control over its own oil — but its efforts to nationalize its oil industry in 2007 did result in arbitration.
A U.S. official tells ABC News that the U.S. Coast Guard is “in active pursuit of a sanctioned dark fleet vessel that is part of Venezuela’s illegal sanctions evasion.” “It is flying a false flag and under a judicial seizure order,” the official added.
“The United States Coast Guard is in active pursuit of a sanctioned dark fleet vessel that is part of Venezuela’s illegal sanctions evasion. It is flying a false flag and under a judicial seizure order,” one of the officials said.
The latest vessel to be targeted by the United States in its pressure campaign on Venezuela was sending distress signals as it headed northeast from the Caribbean into the Atlantic.
Personnel from the United States boarded and seized a vessel off the coast of Venezuela on Saturday, according to an official familiar with the matter, as the Trump administration ramps up pressure on Caracas.
Venezuela’s debt crisis is one of the largest unresolved sovereign defaults in the world, the legacy of years of economic collapse and U.S. sanctions that severed the country from international capital markets.
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