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 weekend as 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 are you going to be buying oil from the Venezuelan dictator,” Diego Mesa, Colombia’s energy minister, said in a separate interview on the sidelines of the CERAWeek industry conference in Houston.

Duque is on Thursday scheduled to visit with US President Joe Biden at the White House, where Venezuela is set to be at the top of the agenda.

Biden on Tuesday banned imports of Russian oil and natural gas into the US to apply more pressure on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine. His administration has at the same time sought other ways to increase oil supply, including potentially easing oil sanctions on Iran.

Brent, the international benchmark, surged to $138 a barrel, the highest since 2008, earlier in the week. It fell back to $111 on Wednesday on hopes of increased output from the Opec group of producers.

Venezuela once produced as much as 2.8mn barrels of oil a day, but its output is now about 700,000 b/d, according to Opec figures. Colombia pumps roughly 800,000 b/d, and Duque said crude exports from his country could be “strategic” for the US.

Analysts say Venezuela’s oil industry has been badly damaged by years of under-investment and sanctions.

“The economy has been destroyed for the last few years. PDVSA has been destroyed,” said Mesa, referring to Venezuela’s state-owned oil company. “Thinking that the Maduro regime is able to increase by 50 per cent its production levels just to replace Russia is just nonsense.”

The White House has confirmed that officials travelled to Venezuela in recent days to discuss the detention of US citizens and energy security.

Two Americans previously arrested in Venezuela were freed on Tuesday after the US visit to Caracas in a sign of a potential diplomatic thaw between the countries.

Antony Blinken, US secretary of state, on Tuesday said the US had a “set of interests” in Venezuela including support for democratic elections, but added that it also had “an interest globally in maintaining a steady supply of energy”.