ALBA-TCP countries condemn the “theft” of another Venezuelan oil tanker by the United States: “This sets a serious precedent”

MADRID, December 22 (EUROPA PRESS) –

The countries that make up the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America-People’s Trade Treaty (ALBA-TCP) condemned the “theft” of another Venezuelan oil tanker by the United States and warned that it sets a “serious precedent” at the international level.

“These actions are part of the strategy to replace regulations with intimidation and dispossession,” they said in a statement, after a second ship was intercepted on Saturday by US forces while carrying Venezuelan oil.

Thus, they accused the United States government of “acting like a privateer” and “illegally depriving the crew of liberty” of the tanker, while warning that “this serious act of piracy committed in international waters violates the letter and spirit of the Charter of the United Nations, the fundamental principles of international law and the text of the Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Maritime Navigation.”

In addition, he assures that it is an “unacceptable aggression against legitimate trade and the sovereignty of States”, which “unmasks a deliberate intention to plunder the natural resources of a sovereign country and creates a very serious precedent for the region and for the international system as a whole”.

The ALBA-TCP underlines that it is a “supremacist strategy of neocolonial domination” aimed at “imposing by force an anarchic order in which violence prevails, by undermining international law and replacing norms with intimidation and dispossession”.

“The Bolivarian Alliance reiterates its full and active solidarity with the people and government of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and supports the exercise of all corresponding legal and diplomatic actions before the competent multilateral bodies,” he said.

Furthermore, these countries demanded the “immediate” cessation of these illegal practices and the determination of “responsibilities”. “This is a reprehensible action that represents a direct aggression against all nations,” he said.

A NEW RAID

The United States made its third incursion into this type of waters off Venezuela on Sunday, while the third oil tanker affected was not on the list of ships sanctioned by the US Treasury.

However, White House Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly later indicated that the tanker was “transporting oil from sanctioned PDVSA” (Venezuela’s state-owned company Petróleos de Venezuela) and that “it is a false flag vessel that was operating as part of the Venezuelan Shadow Fleet to traffic stolen crude oil and finance the narco-terrorist regime” of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

Under these circumstances, official US sources, on condition of anonymity, explained to the Washington Post that the boarding by the US Coast Guard is actually protected by a maritime law known as the “right of visit”, by which a warship can carry out an inspection on a vessel with the mere suspicion that it is involved in illicit activities.

Venezuelan authorities have described this new confiscation as “piracy” which, in Caracas’ view, fails to comply with several standards of international law and represents a “flagrant commission” of a “crime”.