Trump Says U.S. Has Deal for Control of Large Share of Venezuela’s Oil
New York Times · LC · trust 42/100
The president said an agreement between the countries covered more than 65 billion barrels of reserves. A U.S. official said it would involve a partnership with a private company.
Listen · 5:22 min Share full article An oil refinery in Punto Fijo, Venezuela, in 2021. Venezuela’s president, Delcy Rodríguez, said a U.S. oil deal would have a “significant impact on our nation’s revival.” Credit... Adriana Loureiro Fernandez for The New York Times By Rebecca F. Elliott Simon Romero and Edward Wong
The agreement amounts to a highly unusual foray into another country’s oil fields through a partnership with a private company, the State Department said through a U.S. official. The deal would give the United States control of more than 65 billion barrels of proven oil reserves, Mr. Trump said in a social media post . That is almost as much as all of the proven reserves in the United States , which is the world’s biggest oil producer.
Venezuela’s president, Delcy Rodríguez, called the agreement “historic” and said it would have a “significant impact on our nation’s revival.”
She said in a statement that the deal involved the development of 17 oil fields, more than $100 billion of investments and projected taxes of $209 billion for Venezuela’s strapped government, which has been struggling to improve living conditions after earthquakes in June left more than 6,500 people dead.
The aim of the deal, Ms. Rodríguez said, is “putting our immense reserves at the service of national development.”
Details were sparse, however, and the text of the agreement was not immediately available.
The Trump administration deposed and captured Ms. Rodríguez’s predecessor, Nicolás Maduro, in January, transforming a country that had been an adversary into something resembling a client state. As part of the process, the administration made Venezuela’s oil central to its campaign to expand U.S. influence over energy in the Americas, where rising production has helped blunt the loss of oil coming out of the Middle East over the past six months because of the Iran war.
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