Seizing of vessel in Caribbean Sea is seventh apprehension in Trump\u2019s campaign to control Venezuela\u2019s oil flows<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The US military said it seized another oil tanker with links to Venezuela<\/a> on Tuesday, in the Caribbean Sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The report marks the seventh such apprehension<\/a> since the start of Donald Trump\u2019s month-long campaign to control<\/a> Venezuela\u2019s oil flows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The US military\u2019s Southern Command, which is overseeing nearly a dozen warships and thousands of troops in the Caribbean, said in a statement it apprehended the Motor Vessel Sagitta \u201cwithout incident\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe apprehension of another tanker operating in defiance of President Trump\u2019s established quarantine of sanctioned vessels in the Caribbean demonstrates our resolve to ensure that the only oil leaving Venezuela<\/a> will be oil that is coordinated properly and lawfully,\u201d it said in a statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The US president has focused his foreign policy in Latin America on Venezuela, initially aiming to push the Venezuelan president Nicol\u00e1s Maduro<\/a> from power. After failing to find a diplomatic solution, Trump ordered US forces to fly into the country to grab Maduro and his wife in a daring overnight raid on 3 January, bringing them to New York to face criminal charges and detaining them<\/a> there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump has said the US plans to control Venezuela\u2019s oil resources indefinitely as it seeks to rebuild the country\u2019s dilapidated oil industry in a $100bn plan that is prompting<\/a> many raised eyebrows, not least from environmentalists<\/a> and the US oil giants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The vessels intercepted previously have been either under US sanctions or part of a \u201cshadow fleet\u201d of ships that disguise<\/a> their origins to move oil from major sanctioned producers \u2013 Iran, Russia or Venezuela.<\/p>\n\n\n\n