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EXCLUSIVE U.S. to let Eni, Repsol ship Venezuela oil to Europe for debt -sources

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HOUSTON/WASHINGTON, June 5 (Reuters) – Italian oil company Eni SpA and Spain’s Repsol SA could begin shipping Venezuelan oil to Europe as soon as next month to make up for Russian crude, five people familiar with the matter said, resuming oil-for-debt swaps halted two years ago when Washington stepped up sanctions on Venezuela.

The volume of oil Eni and Repsol are expected to receive is not large, one of the people said, and any impact on global oil prices will be modest. But Washington’s greenlight to resume Venezuela’s long-frozen oil flows to Europe could provide a symbolic boost for Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

The U.S. State Department gave the nod to the two companies to resume shipments in a letter, the people said. U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration hopes the Venezuelan crude can help Europe cut dependence on Russia and re-direct some of Venezuela’s cargoes from China. Coaxing Maduro into restarting political talks with Venezuela’s opposition is another aim, two of the people told Reuters.

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The two European energy companies, which have joint ventures with Venezuelan state-run oil company PDVSA, can count the crude cargoes toward unpaid debts and late dividends, the people said.

A key condition, one of the people said, was that the oil received “has to go to Europe. It cannot be resold elsewhere.”

Washington believes PDVSA will not benefit financially from these cash-free transactions, unlike Venezuela’s current oil sales to China, that person said. China has not signed onto Western sanctions on Russia, and has continued to buy Russian oil and gas despite U.S. appeals.

The authorizations came last month, but details and resale restrictions have not been reported previously.

Eni (ENI.MI)declined comment, citing a policy of not commenting “on issues of potential commercial sensitivity.” Repsol (REP.MC) did not reply to requests for comment.

OTHERS EXCLUDED

Washington has not made similar allowances for U.S. oil major Chevron Corp(CVX.N), India’s Oil and Natural Gas Corp Ltd (ONGC) (ONGC.NS) and France’s Maurel & Prom SA(MAUP.PA), which also lobbied the U.S. State Department and U.S. Treasury Department to take oil in return for billions of dollars in accumulated debts from Venezuela.

All five oil companies halted swapping oil for debt in mid-2020 in the midst of former U.S. President Donald Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign that cut Venezuela’s oil exports but failed to oust Maduro.

PDVSA has not scheduled Eni and Repsol to take any cargoes this month, according to a June 3 preliminary PDVSA loading program seen by Reuters.

Venezuela Vice President Delcy Rodriguez tweeted last month she hoped the U.S. overtures “will pave the way for the total lifting of the illegal sanctions which affect our entire people.”

OUTREACH TO CARACAS

The Biden administration held its highest level talks with Caracas in March, and Venezuela freed two of at least 10 jailed U.S. citizens and promised to resume election talks with the opposition. Maduro has yet to agree on a date to return to the negotiating table. read more

Republican lawmakers and some of Biden’s fellow Democrats who oppose any softening of U.S. policy toward Maduro have blasted the U.S. approach to Venezuela as too one-sided.

Washington maintains further sanctions relief on Venezuela will be conditioned on progress toward democratic change as Maduro negotiates with the opposition.

Last month, the Biden administration authorized Chevron, the largest U.S. oil company still operating in Venezuela, to talk to Maduro’s government and PDVSA about future operations in Venezuela. read more

About that time, the U.S. State Department secretly sent letters to Eni and Repsol saying Washington would “not object” if they resumed oil-for-debt deals and brought the oil to Europe, one of the sources told Reuters.

The letters assured them they would face no penalties for taking Venezuelan oil cargoes to collect on pending debt, said two people in Washington.

CHEVON CONSIDERATION

Chevron’s request to the U.S. Treasury to expand its operations in Venezuela came as the State Department issued the no-objection letters to Eni and Repsol. The person familiar with the matter in Washington declined to say whether Chevron’s request remained under consideration.

The U.S. oil major did receive a six-month continuation of a license that preserves its assets and U.S. approval to talk with Venezuelan government officials about future operations. read more

It was not immediately clear if Washington had okayed the prior crude-for-fuel swaps European companies conducted with PDVSA until 2020, exchanges that provided relief to gasoline-thirsty Venezuela.

China has become the largest customer for Venezuelan oil, with as much as 70% of monthly shipments destined for its refiners. read more

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Reporting by Marianna Parraga in Houston and Matt Spetalnick in Washington; writing by Gary McWilliams; Editing by David Gregorio and Lisa Shumaker

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Colombian president calls for ‘no dictators’ at Summit of the Americas as Biden mulls Cuba, Venezuela invites

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Colombian President Iván Duque Márquez weighed in on the controversy surrounding the upcoming Summit of the Americas, saying dictatorships should be unwelcome, while chaos continues to swirl around the Biden administration’s planning of the forum.

The 9th Summit of the Americas is set to be held in Los Angeles, California, beginning Monday. The conference, which began in 1994, brings together countries in the Western Hemisphere within the Organization of American States and is focused on promoting pro-democracy values and coordination among heads of state and top companies with influence in the region.

Fox News talked to President Duque about the upcoming summit during an exclusive interview Thursday, and the leader was adamant that only democratic regimes should be allowed to participate.

“All the members of the Organization of American States, we all defend democracy. And if you want to be a member of the organization, you have to defend democracies. So I clearly believe that the Summit of the Americas shall not be an instrument of non-democratic regimes to participate in order to try to get diplomatic legitimacy. I think no dictatorship shall participate in the Summit of the Americas,” he told Fox News.

Colombia’s President Ivan Duque Marquez addresses the 73rd session of the United Nations General Assembly, at U.N. headquarters, Wednesday, Sept. 26, 2018. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

Controversy around this year’s summit has developed because the Biden administration has not yet released a final list of countries that have been invited or a final agenda. In addition, protests by Latin American immigrants are planned outside the event to protest autocratic leadership in some countries, such as Nicaragua, Cuba, Venezuela and others.

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In addition, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who has not yet said whether he will attend, has threatened to boycott the event if Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela are not extended invitations. 

In response to a question about President López saying the forum must be open to everybody, Duque disagreed.

“I’m not going to enter into a dispute with President López Obrador, I have a good relationship with him. But maybe if we disagree on that, I respectfully disagree because I think this forum is not a forum for dictatorships to participate. It’s clearly the value of democracy that has united the hemisphere,” Duque told Fox News.

“The Democratic Inter-American Charter that was signed on September 11, 2001, is the major achievement in diplomatic terms where we have rejected any form of autocracy in the hemisphere. So this was not a forum for autocrats. This is a forum for people who clearly embrace the value of democracy.”

The Colombian president plans to focus on three major issues while at the summit: migration, climate change solutions, and economic reactivation coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Duque touted a recent milestone on immigration during his interview with Fox News, saying Colombia has granted one million temporary protection status cards for Venezuelans entering the country. The president also stressed the opportunity Colombia has to pave the way for the solution against climate change. 

WASHINGTON, DC – JUNE 02: U.S. President Joe Biden delivers remarks on the recent mass shootings from the White House on June 02, 2022 in Washington, D.C.
(Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

“I think economic reactivation in the post-pandemic world is needed. The U.S. can bring a lot of assets from their companies that were in Asia in order to be located close to the U.S. market but at the same time open job opportunities for many people in Latin American countries. And I clearly believe that will be a deterrent to have a further migration movement towards the U.S. southern border.”

Sergio de la Peña, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for Western Hemisphere affairs at the Pentagon and a retired U.S. Army officer, told Fox News he agrees with Duque that the forum should only welcome democracies, and Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela do not fit that criteria. 

The summit generally deals with “security and prosperity” as core principles, said de la Peña, and it was designed “to be an opportunity for the leadership of this entire hemisphere to get together to discuss issues of mutual interest.”

He said that it’s the “prerogative of the host” to extend invitations to the world leaders, but that generally it would have been appropriate for the invitations to have gone out at least three months in advance to the heads of state. In addition, he said it is not helpful that the Biden administration has not released an agenda, and they should have set some expectation for deliverables heading into the summit.

The former defense official said that although it’s the role of the hosting country to set the message for the forum, “strengthening democracy is huge.” 

“If you’ve seen the way that the alignment of countries in the hemisphere have been taken lately, they are going more toward the left and in some cases troubling so,” he said citing Bolivia and Chile as examples of states following a “model not dissimilar to Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua.”

De la Peña continued: “I hope that there’s something positive that comes out of the summit. The United States is still the indispensable leader in this hemisphere. And the U.S. has to project a level of confident leadership in the conduct of these summits. And there has to be a feeling that the United States has it well in control.”

Isaias Medina, one of the first Venezuelan diplomats to resign his position in June 2017 to protest the policies of dictator Nicolas Maduro, also told Fox News that the message of the summit must be “deterrence against anti-democratic rogue nations.”

Medina told Fox News: “To be unwelcome at the summit of the Americas must definitely include blackballing American oil companies [that] continue to partner with Maduro’s Narco-Kleptocracy. The US allowing Chevron to circumvent sanctions funds to a tyrannical gas lighting dictatorship is no different than giving a blank check to Putin himself to use against Ukraine because Maduro and Putin have joint accounts sucking the country dry.”

“The message in the Summit of the Americas should be a clear unwavering deterrence against anti-democratic rogue nations and their proxy militias, not only in words but in deeds, as Venezuela ramps up its oil development with help from Chevron — Hezbollah, ELN, and FARC are celebrating as an invisible guest in the Summit for prompting funds from Maduro’s criminal syndicate to harvest terrorist organizations three hours from Miami. Is putting money in Maduro’s pocket in the best interest of the Americas?” continued Medina, who also worked as a minister counselor at the Venezuelan mission to the United Nations in New York.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was asked this week during the weekly press briefing about the final invite list and agenda for the summit to which she responded that the administration is “still giving our partners time to decide.”

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She continued: “As you see from press reports, there have been quite a few heads of states who have confirmed via their own announcement. But again, you know, I always bring this back because what’s really important about next week is that the people from around the region are gathering together to address the core challenges facing the people of the hemisphere. Right. Including economic prosperity, climate change, migration crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic. So there is an array of issues for the region that we would that we are going to discuss. These are priorities. These are incredibly important. And that’s what you’re going to see for next week. And others will confirm if they’re attending. We’re not going to do that until we have a final list and give our partners opportunities to decide.”

The press secretary also reportedly said Wednesday when asked about the reason why the White House hadn’t confirmed details less than a week before the start of the summit: “I think if you’ve been following this administration for the past year and a half, one week is not the eleventh hour when it comes to how things move. And so that is a lifetime away for us as a White House.”

Fox News also asked the State Department this week about the Biden administration possibly inviting a lower-level representative from Cuba and whether there is a plan in place to prevent a boycott by Mexico.

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State Department spokesperson Ned Price responded that the administration is “confident” that it will have robust attendance from Latin American countries and the private sector at the forum.

Price said: “We have been in close contact with many of our partners throughout the region. Again, without reading out those discussions. We are confident that the summit will represent — the countries will be representative of the opportunities and the challenges that we face together as partners in Americas.”

Fox News’ Nicholas Kalman contributed to this report.

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World

Biden’s Treasury Department renews Chevron’s oil license to operate in Venezuela

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The U.S. Treasury Department renewed a license Friday for Chevron to operate its oil production in Venezuela, a country sanctioned by the U.S., potentially setting up a broader license agreement later in the year.

The U.S. has previously served as Venezuela’s largest oil market but oil activity between the countries has been limited amid ongoing political turmoil between Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his opposition, Juan Guaido, who the U.S. recognizes as Venezuela’s rightful leader, Reuters reported.

Under the current license, Chevron is allowed to continue to maintain its staff and operation infrastructure as well as payments on third-party invoices, local taxes and utility services.

The license allows Chevron to conduct “transactions and activities necessary for safety or the preservation of assets in Venezuela,” according to the report. The oil company is also able to participate in shareholder and board meetings.

The logo of Dow Jones Industrial Average stock market index listed company Chevron (CVX) is seen in Los Angeles, California, United States, April 12, 2016.  (REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson/FILE / Reuters Photos)

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Venezuelan leader Nicolas Madura.  (Photo by Matias Delacroix/Getty Images / Getty Images)

According to the report, U.S. officials want talks between Maduro and Guaido to advance into a cohesive governing body before any broader license will be issued.

REPUBLICANS SLAM BIDEN FOR DRAINING OIL RESERVES AS GAS PRICES REMAIN AT RECORD HIGH

Chevron was previously permitted to trade oil from the South American country, from 2019 through April 2020, but a maximum pressure campaign by former U.S. President Trump to have Maduro removed ended the activity.

Jan 31, 2020 San Jose / CA / USA – Chevron gas station in south San Francisco bay area (iStock / iStock)

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Venezuelan leaders are soon expected to negotiate for free elections and the release of political prisoners, with Mexico hosting the meeting. A positive outcome of these meetings could result in restoring oil transactions between the U.S. and Venezuela.

Chevron’s new license extends its current agreement through the end of November. 
 

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World

Mexico president threatens to skip Americas Summit

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MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico’s president said Tuesday that he would not attend next month’s Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles if the Biden administration excludes Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua — adding his voice to increasing warnings of a boycott by some leaders across the region.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has been saying in recent weeks that the U.S. government should not exclude anyone from the summit, but he had not previously threatened to stay home.

“If they exclude, if not all are invited, a representative of the Mexican government is going to go, but I would not,” López Obrador said during his daily news conference, fresh off a visit to Cuba. He said his foreign affairs secretary, Marcelo Ebrard, would go.

The Mexican president’s absence would be a blow to the summit expected to deal heavily with the issue of migration at the U.S.-Mexico border. The Biden administration has worked for months to build regional consensus. Cabinet members have been visiting the region urging allies to shore up immigration controls and expand their asylum programs.

“Our goal is … to sign a regional declaration on migration and protection in June in Los Angeles when the United States hosts the Summit of the Americas,” President Joe Biden said in March, when he hosted Colombia President Iván Duque at the White House.

He called for “a new framework of how nations throughout the region can collectively manage migration in the Western Hemisphere.”

Such cooperation will be critical as the U.S. wrestles with the problem of high numbers of migrants arriving at its southern border and prepares to lift a restriction of asylum applications there later this month that is expected to draw even more migrants north.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Brian Nichols has previously said that the governments of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua have shown that they do not respect democracy and would be unlikely to receive invitations. And the U.S. does not even recognize Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro as the country’s legal leader.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki was noncommittal when asked about the invitations on Tuesday, saying “a final decision has not been made.”

“We haven’t made a decision yet about who will be invited and no invitations have been issued yet,” Psaki said during her daily media briefing.

Leaders of Caribbean nations have also discussed a collective boycott of the summit if nations are excluded and criticized the U.S. plan to invite Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó. The U.S. recognizes him as that country’s legitimate president, but many Caribbean nations do not.

“We do not believe in the policy of ostracizing Cuba and Venezuela. We do not recognize Juan Guaidó as the president of Venezuela. In those circumstances, Antigua and Barbuda will not participate,” said that country’s prime minister, Gaston Browne.

He said that a consensus to boycott the summit if countries were excluded had emerged from Caribbean foreign ministers’ meeting in Belize in March, “but I am not sure if the consensus will hold.”

St. Vincent Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves had a similar take: “If Guaidó goes to represent Venezuela, if the Americans were to do that it would be an act of folly,” Gonsalves told a weekend radio program, saying St. Vincent may not attend if Maduro is excluded.

Cuba is an active member of the Caribbean Community of nations and the Communist-governed island has provided thousands of free scholarships to Caribbean medical, engineering and other students since the mid 70s. Successive Venezuelan governments have assisted Caribbean countries with prefabricated housing and cheap oil.

A senior Biden administration official said the blowback is largely posturing in response to a strong diplomatic push from Cuba — a perennial touchstone for the Latin American left — and that the U.S. expects few leaders to follow through on threats to skip the summit.

Behind the scenes, several Caribbean leaders signaled they plan to attend, according to the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private diplomatic communications.

The official said the administration expects both López Obrador and Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro to attend.

Cuba was excluded from first six hemispheric summits, held from 1994 to 2012. But Cuba was invited to the 2015 gathering in Panama following growing threats of a boycott by leftist Latin American leaders if it was excluded – as well as a thaw in relations with the U.S. under President Barack Obama, who met Cuban leader Raul Castro at the event.

Cuba also was invited to the last summit in Peru in 2018, but Castro sent his foreign minister instead because Venezuela’s Maduro had not been invited. U.S. President Donald Trump did not attend either.

Argentina, which currently holds the rotating presidency of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, also issued an appeal this month to avoid excluding any governments.

In a tweet, it called the summit “a great opportunity to build a space for encounters in which all the countries of the hemisphere participate” and urged organizers “to avoid exclusions that impede having all the voices of the hemisphere in dialogue and being heard.”

López Obrador left open the possibility that he could attend if the Biden administration invites all countries. He noted that previous summits had not excluded any countries and blamed the current situation on political minorities in the U.S. backing a “hostile policy.”

“There’s still time before the summit and we could arrive at an agreement, but we have to all unite, look for America’s unity,” he said.

___

Goodman reported from Cleveland, Ohio. AP writers Will Weissert in Washington and Bert Wilkinson contributed to this story from Georgetown, Guyana.

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US

Venezuela releases 2 imprisoned Americans, including Gustavo Cárdenas of ’Citgo 6’

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There was no immediate word on the fate of the other five Citgo executives detained in Venezuela — four of them naturalized U.S. citizens with dual nationality and the other a U.S. legal permanent resident.

President Biden confirmed the release of the two Americans in a statement late Tuesday.

“Tonight, two Americans who were wrongfully detained in Venezuela will be able to hug their families once more,” Biden said. “We are bringing Gustavo Cárdenas and Jorge Fernández home.”

The conditions of the release of the two U.S. citizens were not immediately clear. The release was first reported by the New York Times.

Biden made no mention of the conditions in his statement. He said he was grateful to Roger Carstens, a special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, and other diplomats “for their tireless efforts to secure their release and reunite these families.”

“Unjustly holding Americans captive is always unacceptable,” Biden said. “And even as we celebrate the return of Cárdenas and Fernández, we also remember the names and the stories of every American who is being unjustly held against their will — in Venezuela, in Russia, in Afghanistan, Syria, China, Iran, and elsewhere around the world.”

The two men had returned to the United States by Wednesday morning, accompanied by Roger Carstens, special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, according to Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

“We express our deepest appreciation to our many partners around the world who joined us in calling for their release,” Blinken said in a statement. “While we welcome this important positive step we continue to press for the release of all wrongfully detained U.S. nationals in Venezuela and around the world.”

A group of senior U.S. officials traveled to Caracas on Saturday for a meeting with President Nicolás Maduro to discuss the possibility of easing sanctions on Venezuelan oil exports as the Biden administration weighed banning imports of Russian oil. The delegation also called for the release of imprisoned Americans, including members of the “Citgo 6” as well as two former Green Berets who were accused in a plot to remove Maduro and a former Marine who was arrested while traveling along the Caribbean coast of Venezuela.

The long-sought release of the Americans signals a potential thaw in the relationship between the Biden administration and the Maduro government, Russia’s most important ally in South America, and comes as the U.S. government tries to isolate Russian President Vladimir Putin after the invasion of Ukraine.

The six executives of Houston-based Citgo Petroleum, an oil refiner formerly controlled by the Maduro government, were invited to Venezuela for a meeting in November 2017. Once they arrived in Caracas, masked security agents detained all six men, and they were imprisoned on what the State Department has called “specious charges without due process or access to a fair trial.”

They were later charged with money laundering, embezzlement, racketeering and participating in organized crime. They denied the allegations, and their lawyers have maintained their innocence.

For four years, family members of the Citgo 6 have urged the U.S. government to help protect their imprisoned relatives and secure their release. Last month, a Venezuelan court upheld long prison sentences for the six oil executives.

The Citgo 6 were interviewed by the U.S. delegation over the weekend, according to a person with direct knowledge of the case who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the negotiations. The visit was coordinated by the Maduro government, according to the person. A U.S. diplomat met with some of the prisoners in December.

Speaking on Venezuela’s state-run television Monday night, Maduro described the meeting with the U.S. delegation as “respectful” and “very diplomatic,” adding that the two countries “agreed to work on an agenda moving forward.”

White House press secretary Jen Psaki on Monday declined to comment on whether the need for oil would be worth reinstating a relationship with Maduro.

“I think that’s leaping several stages ahead,” Psaki said. She said the talks about the imprisoned Americans were not intertwined with discussions about easing sanctions.

The United States and Venezuela broke off diplomatic relations in 2019 after the U.S. government recognized Juan Guaidó as the country’s legitimate president, accusing Maduro of winning reelection through fraud.

The Citgo 6 were granted house arrest in December 2019 but were sent back to jail two months later, on the day that President Donald Trump welcomed Guaidó to the White House. They were granted house arrest again in April 2021, but were re-jailed in October after the extradition of a close Maduro ally to the United States, where he was wanted on charges of money laundering.

Over the years, relatives of the imprisoned Citgo executives have expressed concern about the fragile health of at least two of the men. In 2020, the wife of one of the executives, Tomeu Vadell, told The Washington Post she was shocked by his appearance during a visit in 2018.

“He used to weigh 220, and he was down to 160 pounds. … He looked [like] a prisoner of war,” said Dennysse Vadell, Tomeu’s wife. “We just want him back home.”

Schmidt reported from Bogotá, Colombia. John Wagner in Washington contributed to this report.

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US

EXCLUSIVE Washington pins easing of Venezuela sanctions on direct oil supply to U.S. -sources

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An oil pumpjack painted with the colors of the Venezuelan flag is seen in Lagunillas, Venezuela January 29, 2019. REUTERS/Isaac Urrutia

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HOUSTON/WASHINGTON, March 8 (Reuters) – U.S. officials have demanded Venezuela supply at least a portion of oil exports to the United States as part of any agreement to ease oil trading sanctions on the OPEC member nation, two people close to the matter said.

U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday banned U.S. imports of Russian oil in retaliation for the invasion of Ukraine, ramping up economic pressure on a key Venezuelan ally.

U.S. diplomats have worked to find energy supplies worldwide that can help compensate for disruption to Russian oil and gas exports caused by sanctions or war. U.S. officials met Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in Caracas for the first bilateral talks in years on Saturday.

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Venezuela has been under U.S. oil sanctions since 2019 and could reroute crude if those restrictions were lifted.

U.S. officials made clear their priority was to secure supplies for the United States, the people told Reuters. The officials told their Venezuelan counterparts that any relaxation in U.S. sanctions would be conditional on Venezuela shipping oil directly to the United States, the sources said.

The United States had not previously made stipulations about the specific destination of cargoes permitted under waivers to sanctions.

The U.S. Department of State and Venezuelan state run energy company PDVSA did not immediately reply to requests for comment.

Chevron Corp (CVX.N), the last U.S. oil producer still operating in Venezuela, could be the first beneficiary if a deal is reached with Maduro’s administration. Chevron has been barred from shipping Venezuelan oil from its joint ventures since 2020 and has pushed to overturn the ban.

A Chevron spokesperson declined to comment on the U.S. discussions. The company operates “in compliance with the current sanctions framework provided by the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control,” he said.

The California-based company has a special license that allows it to maintain a low-level presence in the country, only to ensure the maintenance and safety of its facilities.

With that license due to expire in June, Chevron has sought authorization from the U.S. Treasury Department to trade Venezuelan oil cargoes for debt repayment through a revamped exemption, Reuters has reported. Chevron wants the revised permit so it can recoup hundreds of million dollars in unpaid debt and late dividends from its joint ventures with PDVSA.

If Washington decides to ease sanctions, Chevron could be in position to partially recover production in Venezuela and resume exports to its own and other refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast, one of the sources said, replacing Russian barrels.

Chevron had no immediate comment.

Little progress was made in the weekend talks as Washington sought to gauge prospects for peeling Maduro away from his alliance with Russian President Vladimir Putin. But the parties agreed to further talks.

The sides established what one person familiar with the matter called “maximalist” negotiating positions. Washington pressed for free presidential elections and for the release of Americans jailed in Venezuela, while Maduro asked for a wide lifting of sanctions.

But the most pressing topic was energy. The parties discussed returning Venezuelan oil to markets hit by disruptions of Russian supplies and a workaround for PDVSA to temporarily access international bank transfers, according to the sources.

The meeting sparked strong reactions on Capitol Hill, where New Jersey Senator Robert Menendez and other U.S. lawmakers criticized the outreach to Maduro, who is under U.S. sanctions for human rights abuses.

The U.S. engagement comes as Venezuela’s financial lifeline to Russia is fraying under sanctions on Moscow following its bombardment of Ukraine. Venezuela’s funds held in Russian banks blacklisted by Washington have been frozen.

Oil prices rose another 5% on Tuesday to $128 per barrel on the U.S. import ban on Russia – which accounted for 670,000 barrels per day in 2021. Britain said it will phase out Russian imports by year end.

Venezuela’s oil production last year recovered from free fall and averaged 636,000 bpd. Officials have said it can boost output and exports, but analysts believe there is little room for further increases without massive new spending.

However, many refiners in the U.S. Gulf Coast that were importing Russian barrels could potentially resume processing Venezuelan heavy oil and fuel, among their preferred feedstock for specialized units.

Before sanctions, U.S. Valero Energy (VLO.N), Citgo Petroleum, Chevron and PBF Energy (PBF.N) were among top U.S. buyers of Venezuelan oil.

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Reporting by Marianna Parraga in Houston and Matt Spetalnick in Washington; additional reporting by Vivian Sequera in Caracas and Gary McWilliams in Houston; Editing by Stephen Coates

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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World

Russia won’t rule out military deployment to Cuba, Venezuela

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MOSCOW — Russia raised the stakes Thursday in its dispute with the West over Ukraine and NATO’s expansion when a top diplomat refused to rule out a military deployment to Cuba and Venezuela if tensions with the United States escalate.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said he could “neither confirm nor exclude” the possibility of Russia sending military assets to Latin America if the U.S. and its allies don’t curtail their military activities on Russia’s doorstep.

“It all depends on the action by our U.S. counterparts,” the minister said in an interview with Russian television network RTVI, citing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s warning that Moscow could take unspecified “military-technical measures” if the U.S. and its allies fail to heed its demands.

Ryabkov led a Russian delegation in talks with the U.S. on Monday. The negotiations in Geneva and a related NATO-Russia meeting in Brussels took place in response to a significant Russian troop buildup near Ukraine that the West fears might be a prelude to an invasion.

Russia, which annexed Ukraine’s Crimea Peninsula in 2014, has denied having plans to attack the neighboring country. The Kremlin reacted to the suggestion by accusing NATO of threatening its territory and demanding that the military alliance never embrace Ukraine or any other ex-Soviet nations as new members.

Washington and its allies firmly rejected the demand this week as a nonstarter, but the NATO and Russian delegations agreed to leave the door open to further talks on arms control and other issues intended to reduce the potential for hostilities.

A senior Biden administration official suggested Thursday that Ryabkov’s statement about Cuba and Venezuela had not changed Washington’s calculations.

“We are not going to respond to bluster. If Russia actually started moving in that direction, we would deal with it decisively,” said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing negotiations.

Ryabkov last month compared the current tensions over Ukraine with the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis — when the Soviet Union deployed missiles to Cuba and the U.S. imposed a naval blockade of the island.

That crisis ended after U.S. President John F. Kennedy and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev agreed that Moscow would withdraw its missiles in exchange for Washington’s pledge not to invade Cuba and the removal of U.S. missiles from Turkey.

Putin, in seeking to curtail the West’s military activity in Eastern Europe, has argued that NATO could use Ukrainian territory to deploy missiles capable of reaching Moscow in just five minutes. He warned that Russia could gain a similar capability by deploying warships armed with the latest Zircon hypersonic cruise missile in neutral waters.

Soon after his first election in 2000, Putin ordered the closure of a Soviet-built military surveillance facility in Cuba as he sought to improve ties with Washington. Moscow has intensified contacts with Cuba in recent years as tensions with the U.S. and its allies mounted.

In December 2018, Russia briefly dispatched a pair of its nuclear-capable Tu-160 bombers to Venezuela in a show of support for Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro amid Western pressure.

Ryabkov said a refusal by the U.S. and its allies to consider the key Russian demand for guarantees against the alliance’s expansion to Ukraine and other ex-Soviet nations makes it hard to discuss the confidence-building steps that Washington says it’s ready to negotiate.

“The U.S. wants to conduct a dialogue on some elements of the security situation … to ease the tensions and then continue the process of geopolitical and military development of the new territories, coming closer to Moscow,” he said. “We have nowhere to retreat.”

Ryabkov described U.S. and NATO military deployments and drills near Russia’s territory as extremely destabilizing. He said U.S. nuclear-capable strategic bombers flew just 15 kilometers (9 miles) from Russia’s border.

“We are constantly facing a provocative military pressure intended to test our strength,” he said, adding that he wondered how Americans would react “if our bombers fly within 15 kilometers off some U.S. bases on the East or the West Coast.”

The high-stakes diplomacy this week took place as an estimated 100,000 Russian troops with tanks and other heavy weapons are massed near Ukraine’s eastern border. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Thursday rebuffed the West’s calls for a troop pullback from areas near Ukraine.

“It’s hardly possible for NATO to dictate to us where we should move our armed forces on Russian territory,” he said.

Peskov said this week’s talks produced “some positive elements and nuances,” but he characterized them as unsuccessful overall.

“The talks were initiated to receive specific answers to concrete principal issues that were raised, and disagreements remained on those principal issues, which is bad,” Peskov said in a conference call with reporters.

He warned of a complete rupture in U.S.-Russia relations if proposed sanctions targeting Putin and other top civilian and military leaders are adopted. The measures, proposed by Senate Democrats, would also target leading leading Russian financial institutions if Moscow sends troops into Ukraine.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov likewise denounced the proposed sanctions as a reflection of U.S. “arrogance,” adding that Moscow expects a written response to its demands from the U.S. and NATO next week in order to mull further steps.

Tensions revolving around Ukraine and Russia’s demands on the West again appeared on the table at a Thursday meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Vienna.

Polish Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau, who assumed the position of the OSCE’s chairman-in-office, noted in his opening speech that “the risk of war in the OSCE area is now greater than ever before in the last 30 years.”

The tensions over Ukraine also figured high on the agenda of a meeting of European Union foreign ministers in Brest, France. Danish Foreign Minister Jeppe Kofod said it’s important “for Putin to understand that the military threats, the game he’s playing, the way he’s trying to take us back to the darkest days of the Cold War, is totally unacceptable.”

The EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, reiterated that “any further aggression against Ukraine will have massive consequences and severe costs for Russia.” Borrell said the 27-country bloc is providing 31 million euros ($35.5 million) in logistical assistance to the Ukrainian army and is preparing to send a mission to help the country counter cyberattacks.

Russia seized the Crimean Peninsula after the ouster of Ukraine’s Moscow-friendly leader and in 2014 also threw its weight behind a separatist insurgency in eastern Ukraine. More than 14,000 people have been killed in nearly eight years of fighting between the Russia-backed rebels and Ukrainian forces.

Asked whether he’s worried about possible cofrontation, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said “it is absolutely essential that the dialogue that is taking place find a way allowing for de-escalation of tension … to avoid any kind of confrontation that will be a disaster for Europe and for the world.”

Commenting on the possibility of Russia deploying its military assets to Cuba and Venezuela, Guterres said: “We have seen rhetoric escalation in the recent past. What we need is to make sure that we can create conditions for peace and stability in Europe.”

———

Emily Schultheis reported from Vienna. Lorne Cook in Brussels, Edith M. Lederer at the United Nastions and Colleen Long in Washington contributed to this report.

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Jailed American in Venezuela tells family he’s in ‘complete shock’ after visit from Biden official

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The family of an American citizen who’s been held hostage along with five other executives from their company, Citgo, told NBC News they were surprised but grateful that a top Biden administration official visited the men in Venezuela.

Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs Roger Carstens spoke to the families of the former executives Friday about the “wellness check.”

“He said he was impressed at how strong they maintained themselves throughout these four years,” said Carlos Añez, whose father Jorge Toledo is detained, about the families’ conversation with Carstens. “I think it’s a very important step.” 

Jorge Toledo, former vice president of supply and marketing for Citgo, with his wife and two children.Courtesy Toledo Family

Carstens returned from a visit to Venezuela Friday to check on the health of nine Americans being held there.

It’s the first time in two years there is a visit of this nature by a senior U.S. government official. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro broke diplomatic ties with the U.S. in 2019, after former President Donald Trump recognized opposition leader Juan Guaidó as the South American country’s interim president. The U.S. embassy in Caracas was shuttered in March 2019.

Those being held in Caracas include the six former Citgo executives who were jailed since 2017 on corruption charges stemming from a never executed deal to refinance Citgo’s debt. Citgo, based in Houston, is the U.S. subsidiary of the Venezuelan state-owned oil giant Petróleos de Venezuela, or PDVSA.

During a phone call after the visit with his family, Toledo said from prison that he was in “complete shock” to see Carstens.

“My dad’s spirits were lifted a little bit by the visit, which is great because he had been quite down for a while,” said Añez.

A State Department spokesperson said in an emailed statement, “we can confirm that the Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs Roger Carstens traveled to Caracas for discussions about the welfare and safety of U.S. nationals in Venezuela.” 

The six Citgo men, Jorge Toledo, Tomeu Vadell, Jose Luis Zambrano, Alirio Zambrano, Gustavo Cárdenas and José Pereira, were arrested just before Thanksgiving in 2017. They had been called for a last-minute meeting in Venezuela. Once in the conference room at the PDVSA headquarters in Caracas, armed, masked security agents arrested the men.

CITGO oil executives, from left, Jose Angel Pereira, Gustavo Cardenas, Jorge Toledo, Jose Luis Zambrano, Tomeu Vadell and Alirio Jose Zambrano, stand outside the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service in Caracas, Venezuela, in an undated photo posted on Twitter by Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza.Venezuela’s Foreign Ministry via AP file

The men have been granted house arrest twice since their detention. The first time lasted two months. The second time was in April 2021 and they were re-jailed in October on the same day Alex Saab — a close Maduro-ally — was extradited to the U.S. from Cape Verde on money laundering charges.

There are three other Americans jailed. Two of them are former U.S. Special Forces soldiers Luke Denman and Airan Berry, who were sentenced to 20 years for their part in a failed beach attack aimed at overthrowing Maduro, according to Venezuelan prosecutors.

The ninth American is retired Marine Matthew Heath, who was arrested and charged with terrorism in September 2020 for allegedly having an arsenal in his car.

A former congressional staffer with knowledge of prior negotiations told NBC News one of the factors complicating the cases of the jailed Americans is that the Venezuelan government has been repeatedly punished, even after making goodwill gestures.

American Joshua Holt was released from prison in Venezuela in 2018 after long negotiations. Venezuelan Governor Rafael Lacava was instrumental in his release, even traveling to Washington D.C. to discuss the case. Months later, the Trump administration sanctioned Lacava.

“It was very unfortunate, because he had been extremely helpful,” said the staffer. “What Venezuelan authorities heard from the United States was ‘give us these people and we will just continue to sanction.’”

Weeks before the 2020 U.S. elections, U.S. envoy Richard Grenell met with Jorge Rodríguez, a close associate of Maduro, in Mexico City in an attempt to secure the release of the Citgo 6. The Venezuelan government offered that if the U.S. dropped its request for extradition for Alex Saab, they would release all American citizens.

“I think there was a pretty hellacious fight over that after he returned,” the former staffer said. The U.S. did not accept the offer and the Biden administration extradited Saab in October.

“The Venezuelan government feels they’ve gotten punished,” the source said.

Maduro’s government also suspended negotiations with the opposition in response to the extradition.

“It is my view that if the negotiations are renewed with engagement and support from the United States to find a negotiated settlement between the government and the opposition,” the former staffer said, “that would help create conditions for the release of imprisoned Americans.”

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Top State Dept official travels to Venezuela to meet with detained Americans

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Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs Roger Carstens’ quiet visit to the capital city of Caracas represents a significant development as efforts to free the men, many of whom have been imprisoned for years by the government of embattled Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro, have yet to succeed.

“We can confirm that the Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs Roger Carstens traveled to Caracas for discussions about the welfare and safety of US nationals in Venezuela,” a State Department official said Friday.

“We continue to advocate for the immediate and unconditional release of all wrongfully detained US nationals in Venezuela at every opportunity,” the official said.

According to a source familiar, the administration was able to work with the Maduro government to arrange the visits to check on a group of detained oil executives known as the “CITGO 6,” who have just begun their fifth year in Venezuelan detention, as well as three other Americans who have been detained since 2020. This source said the Maduro government was accommodating of the visit.

No American officials had been able to meet in person with the detained men in years, as the US severed diplomatic ties with Maduro under the Trump administration.

Carstens traveled with a small State Department delegation, the source familiar said, and national security adviser Jake Sullivan and Secretary of State Antony Blinken personally advocated for the trip.

According to family members of the CITGO 6, Carstens visited with the men — Tomeu Vadell, Gustavo Cardenas, Jorge Toledo, Alirio Jose Zambrano, Jose Luis Zambrano and Jose Angel Pereira — for about an hour and a half at El Helicoide, where they are imprisoned.

The State Department briefed the families about the visit on Friday, after Carstens had returned to Washington. The Associated Press was first to report on Carstens’ trip.

His meeting with the CITGO 6 came as a total shock, several of the family members told CNN.

Carstens “actually brought pictures of him with our families” to prove his identity to the detained Americans, said Alexandra Z. Forseth, the daughter of Alirio Jose Zambrano and niece of Jose Luis Zambrano. She said it seemed that the guards at the prison gave the men some privacy to meet with Carstens.

“I think it was very uplifting for both parties,” she told CNN.

One of the men recognized Carstens and was so taken aback that he asked to touch his face to see if it was really him. Carstens gave each of the men a hug before he left, the source familiar said.

The CITGO 6 — five US citizens and one permanent resident — were summoned to Venezuela in November 2017 for an emergency work meeting, where they were arrested on corruption charges.

As CNN reported in recent weeks, the men have become pawns in the geopolitical confrontation between the US government and the Maduro regime. Carstens’ visit comes follows increased public scrutiny from the families over the lack of progress in securing the group’s release.

The US envoy was also able to meet jointly with Luke Denman and Airan Berry, two US veterans arrested in May 2020 on accusations by Maduro that they were attempting a coup, as well as with Matthew Heath, another US veteran who was arrested in September 2020 and accused of being a terrorist.

Denman’s brother Mark described it as a “welfare check” and said the meeting lasted about 45 minutes. Heath’s family said Carstens “was able to conduct a brief wellness check.”

CNN’s Isa Soares and Vasco Cotovio contributed to this report.

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Border problems mount as countries refuse to take migrants back

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Migrants fleeing countries that refuse to take them back are driving new backlogs in the U.S. immigration system — and White House and Homeland Security officials worry this poses a growing obstacle to balancing humanitarian and national security concerns.

Driving the news: U.S. officials at the southern border have come across an average of nearly 800 Venezuelan migrants each day for the past week— more than any other nationality except those from Mexico, according to internal immigration data obtained by Axios.

  • There are now more Venezuelans in border custody than any other nationality, followed closely by Nicaragua. A record 13,400 crossed the border in October.
  • More than 5,000 Cubans, Brazilians and Venezuelans crossed the dangerous Darién Gap into Panama last month, on top of more than 17,000 Haitians, according to Panamanian government data.

What they’re saying: “The Department of Homeland Security is committed to ensuring safe, orderly and humane immigration processes,” said DHS spokesperson Eduardo Silva.

  • “DHS, in coordination with the Department of State, has regular discussions with partner countries in the hemisphere on migration-related matters, and continues to engage with foreign governments to improve cooperation with countries that systematically refuse or delay the repatriation of their nationals.”

The big picture: Overall, numbers at the border are far lower than they were earlier this year, during the peak of children and families illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

  • But an unprecedented number of migrant adults are coming from countries that make deportation difficult, primarily Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and Brazil.
  • The U.S. government must decide whether to detain long term or release most single adults coming from nations reluctant to accept back their own citizens when the U.S. turns them away.

Between the lines: Cuba and Venezuela are some of the least cooperative countries when it comes to U.S. efforts to return migrants who don’t qualify for asylum or other protections.

  • Brazil and Nicaragua accept a limited number of deportation flights but require extensive notice, and otherwise make it more difficult than other parts of the world.
  • Mexico also refuses migrants from these countries under the controversial pandemic-related policy called Title 42.
  • Migrants are further complicating the situation by heading toward smaller, understaffed border sectors such as Del Rio, Texas, and Yuma, Arizona, one DHS official told Axios.

Haitians held in a migrant camp under a bridge in Del Rio drew national attention in September.

  • Of the roughly 25,000 migrants who surged the sector during the month, only about a third were from Haiti, according to other internal data viewed by Axios.
  • Another third were Venezuelan, but their home country was not as willing as Haiti to accept multiple deportation flights a day.
  • However, 69% of the 21,000 people who arrived Sept. 9-24 were Haitian, a DHS official told Axios.

Over the past week, border crossers from farther-away countries outpaced those from Mexico or the Northern Triangle nations of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.

  • On Sunday alone, nearly 800 of these migrants from South America, Africa and other distant regions were released into the U.S.

What to watch: The administration is trying to address the issue, first by asking Mexico to ramp up enforcement. Mexico is already considering stricter requirements for entry for Venezuelans, as Reuters reported.

  • There also are plans to be more aggressive in detaining migrants from recalcitrant countries in the hope of deterring future migration.
  • And the U.S. is in discussions with Central American nations to find ways to send some migrants to them, according to two government immigration officials.

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