Colombia warns US against replacing Russian oil with Venezuelan supply

Colombia warns US against replacing Russian oil with Venezuelan supply

Colombia has warned against the idea that oil from neighbouring Venezuela could help fill shortfalls left by the US’s ban on Russian petroleum imports, arguing it would shift business from one authoritarian regime to another.

US diplomats travelled to Caracas last weekendas Washington searches for more oil to replace Russian supply. The trip fuelled speculation that the White House might ease sanctions that have squeezed oil output from Venezuela, once one of the world’s biggest producers.

But Colombian government officials told the Financial Times that enlisting the regime of Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro to supply more oil would be both politically problematic and technically infeasible.

“It’s not for me either to judge nor to justify,” said Iván Duque, Colombia’s president. “But nothing is going to change my opinion about Maduro being a war criminal or being the equivalent of the Latin America [Slobodan] Milosevic because he has brutalised his own country,” he added, referring to the late leader of Serbia.

Duque added that the US, along with many other western governments, does not recognise Maduro as the legitimate president of Venezuela after Washington branded elections in 2018 as fraudulent.

“If you’ve just banned oil from what they call the Russian dictator, it’s difficult to explain why