Washington– US military forces boarded a sanctioned tanker in the Indian Ocean after tracking the ship from the Caribbean Sea as part of an operation Oil quarantine aims to put pressure on VenezuelaDefense Minister Pete Hegseth said Monday.
Venezuela faced US sanctions over its oil and relied on a shadow fleet of tankers carrying false flags. Smuggling crude oil into global supply chains. After the American raid to arrest him Then-president Nicolas Maduro In early January, several tankers fled the Venezuelan coast, including a ship that was boarded in the Indian Ocean overnight.
Hegseth has vowed to eventually seize all of those ships, telling a group of shipyard workers in Maine on Monday that “the only direction I have given my military commanders is that none of them escape.”
He added: “I don’t care if we have to travel around the world to get them, we will get them.”
Later on Monday, the US military said it had carried out another attack A fatal blow on a ship Accused of drug trafficking in the Eastern Pacific.
The US Southern Command said that the raid resulted in the death of two people and one person survived. Southern Command said it had notified the US Coast Guard to activate the survivor’s search and rescue system. A video linked to the post shows a boat moving through the water before it explodes and catches fire.
Monday’s attack brings the death toll from Trump administration strikes on alleged drug boats to 130 people.
The Trump administration has Seizing seven oil tankers As part of its broader efforts To control From the oil of the South American country. Unlike those previous actions, the Aquila 2 has not been formally seized and placed under U.S. control, a defense official said.
Instead, the ship is being held while the United States decides its final fate, according to the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing decision-making process.
The Aquila 2 tanker is a Panama-flagged tanker under US sanctions related to the shipping of illicit Russian oil. Tracking data for the ship, owned by a company with a listed address in Hong Kong, shows it has spent much of last year with its radio transceiver turned off, a practice known as “going dark” that is commonly used by smugglers to hide their locations.
It was one of at least 16 tankers that escaped the Venezuelan coast last month, according to Samir Madani, co-founder of TankerTrackers.com, who said his organization used satellite images and surface photos to document the ship’s movements. According to data transmitted from the ship on Monday, it is not currently carrying a shipment of crude oil.
The Pentagon’s post on X said the military “implemented a visitation and maritime embargo” on the ship.
“The Aquila 2 was operating in defiance of President Trump’s quarantine on sanctioned ships in the Caribbean,” the Pentagon said. “He ran, and we followed him.”
A Navy official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss military operations, did not say what forces were being used in the operation, but confirmed that the destroyers USS Pinckney and USS John Finn as well as the mobile base ship USS Miguel Keith were operating in the Indian Ocean.
In videos posted by the Pentagon on social media, uniformed forces can be seen boarding a Navy helicopter taking off from a ship matching Miguel Keith’s image. Videos and photos of the tanker also appear taken from inside a destroyed Navy helicopter sailing alongside the ship.
since The United States ousts Maduro In a surprise night raid on January 3, the Trump administration began carrying out a surprise night raid Production controlRefining and distributing Venezuelan petroleum products worldwide. Officials in the Republican administration of President Donald Trump made it clear that they viewed the seizure of the tankers as a move A way to generate money As they seek to rebuild Venezuela’s damaged oil industry and restore its economy.
Trump has tried that too Restricting the flow of oil to CubaWhich faces strict economic sanctions by the United States and relies heavily on oil shipments from allies such as Mexico, Russia and Venezuela.
Since the Venezuelan operation, Trump has said that no more Venezuelan oil will go to Cuba, and that the Cuban government is ready to fall. Trump also recently signed… Executive order that would impose tariffs On any goods from countries that sell or supply oil to Cuba, the pressure is primarily on Mexico because it has been Cuba’s oil lifeline.
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Associated Press writer Patrick Whittle in Bath, Maine, contributed to this report.
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This story has been corrected to show that the destroyer’s name is USS John Finn, not USS Johnson.