several months<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\nMembers of the Trump administration confirmed reports that the US coastguard led an operation to commandeer the vessel on Wednesday afternoon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But few details have been released about the circumstances of the seizure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve just seized a tanker off the coast of Venezuela \u2013 large tanker, very large, largest one ever seized, actually,\u201d Trump said during an event at the White House. \u201cAnd other things are happening. So you\u2019ll be seeing that later, and you\u2019ll be talking about that later with some other people.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When faced with questions about the tanker at a roundtable with business leaders, Trump encouraged reporters to \u201cfollow the tanker\u201d to find out more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He also declined to identify the vessel\u2019s owner. But, he added, \u201cI assume we\u2019re going to keep the oil.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Venezuelan government responded to the seizure, accusing the US of carrying out a \u201cblatant theft\u201d, which it described as an \u201cact of international piracy, publicly announced by the President of the United States\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Venezuela would \u201cdefend its sovereignty, natural resources, and national dignity with absolute determination\u201d, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement, adding that it would also denounce the US before international bodies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
US Attorney General Pam Bondi posted on social media that the tanker had been seized for transporting \u201csanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Al Jazeera: The United States has seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, where President Donald Trump has been threatening military action for the last\u00a0several months. Members of the Trump administration confirmed reports that the US coastguard led an operation to commandeer the vessel on Wednesday afternoon. But few details have been released about the circumstances of the seizure. \u201cWe\u2019ve just seized a tanker off the coast of Venezuela \u2013 large tanker, very large, largest one ever seized, actually,\u201d Trump said during an event at the White House. \u201cAnd other things are happening. So you\u2019ll be seeing that… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":53155,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53152","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-in-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53152","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=53152"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53152\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53154,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53152\/revisions\/53154"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/53155"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=53152"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=53152"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=53152"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}