Several oil tankers that had quietly departed Venezuelan waters earlier this month are now returning to the country, even as strict US restrictions remain in place. According to Venezuela’s state oil company PDVSA and maritime monitoring firm TankerTrackers.com, at least four tankers, most of them carrying crude, have re-entered Venezuelan waters after sailing with their transponders switched off, a practice known as operating in “dark mode”.
Last month, a flotilla of roughly a dozen oil-laden vessels, along with at least three empty ships, left Venezuela in what appeared to be a deliberate challenge to the embargo imposed by US President Donald Trump in mid-December. The sanctions sharply reduced Venezuela’s oil exports, pushing shipments to some of their lowest levels in years.
One of the vessels in the group, the Panama-flagged supertanker M Sophia, was intercepted and seized by US authorities earlier this week while attempting to return. Another ship, the Aframax tanker Olina, sailing under the flag of São Tomé and PrÃncipe, was also intercepted but later released and allowed to head back to Venezuelan waters, PDVSA said on Friday.
Satellite imagery reviewed by TankerTrackers.com showed that three additional ships from the same flotilla had also returned. These included the Panama-flagged Merope, the Cook Islands-flagged Min Hang, and the Panama-flagged Thalia III, all of which were detected in Venezuelan waters late on Friday.
US officials confirmed that the tanker Olina, previously known as Minerva M, would be freed. They indicated that the next phase could involve the resumption of more structured crude exports, linked to an oil supply agreement worth around two billion dollars that is currently being discussed between Washington and Caracas. This would mark a significant shift after the United States captured and extracted President Nicolas Maduro last week and placed Venezuela under close supervision.
US President Donald Trump told senior oil industry executives during a meeting on Friday that preparations for the oil supply arrangement were moving forward. In a further sign of easing restrictions, global trading firms Vitol and Trafigura reportedly received the first US licences this week to negotiate and transport Venezuelan crude. Sources also indicated that shipments of naphtha to Venezuela are expected to resume, potentially supporting the country’s oil production and export capacity in the coming weeks.
