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The U.S. Coast Guard is still pursuing a sanctioned oil tanker in international waters, a U.S. official told CBS News on Monday, as the Trump administration appeared to step up attacks on oil ships as part of a pressure campaign aimed at the Venezuelan government.
The Coast Guard attempted to board the tanker, called Bella 1, over the weekend after the Justice Department obtained a seizure warrant based on the vessel’s previous involvement in the Iranian oil trade, a U.S. official said.
But the ship – which had not yet entered Venezuelan waters – refused to be boarded and move away, fleeing towards the Caribbean. An active pursuit began, with the ship sending distress signals to nearby vessels. That pursuit was still ongoing as of Monday afternoon, according to the official.
A U.S. official told CBS News on Sunday that the pursuit involves “a sanctioned Black Fleet vessel that is part of Venezuela’s illegal sanctions evasion program.”
“It is flying a false flag and is the subject of a judicial seizure order,” they said.
The coast guard’s pursuit of the tanker was first reported by Reuters. U.S. officials who spoke to Reuters did not give a specific location of the operation or the name of the vessel being pursued.
If captured and seized, it would be the third Venezuelan oil tanker captured by the United States. this month.
In a pre-dawn operation Saturday, the U.S. Coast Guard seized a Panama-flagged vessel called Centuries. A U.S. official told CBS News that the ship interdiction followed a similar pattern to a previous U.S. seizure of an oil tanker near Venezuela.
And earlier this month, sources told CBS News that the U.S. military had seized a 20-year-old sanctioned tanker called The Skipper who had just left the port of Venezuela.
White House deputy press secretary Anna Kelly said on social media that the tanker seized Saturday was “a false flag vessel operating as part of the Venezuelan Shadow Fleet to traffic stolen oil and finance Maduro’s narcoterrorist regime.”
In a statement Saturday, the Venezuelan government condemned the seizure of the ship, saying it was a “serious act of piracy.”
“The colonialist model that the US government seeks to impose through such practices will fail and will be defeated by the Venezuelan people,” the statement said.
He added that “these acts will not go unpunished” and that Venezuela “will exercise all corresponding actions, including filing a complaint with the United Nations Security Council, other multilateral agencies and world governments.”
President Trump last week called for a “total and complete blockade” of all sanctioned oil tankers entering or leaving Venezuela. This is part of the ongoing pressure campaign against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
Kevin Hassett, director of the White House National Economic Council, said on Sunday: “Take on the Nation with Margaret Brennan“that the first two tankers seized operated on the black market and supplied oil to countries under sanctions.
“And so I don’t think people should be worried here in the United States about prices going up because of these seizures of these ships,” he added. “There are only a few, and they were black market ships.”
The targeting of the tankers comes as Mr. Trump has ordered the Defense Department to carry out a series of attacks on ships in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean that his administration says are smuggling fentanyl and other illegal drugs into the United States. At least 104 people have been killed in 28 known strikes since early September.
