WASHINGTON.- President Donald Trump announced Wednesday that he will end the licenses for the export of oil that his predecessor, Joe Biden, granted Venezuela and explained that these concessions, which benefited the Chevron oil company, will cease to be in force as of March 1.
Trump made the announcement through a message in his social network Truth Social, in which he criticized the “regime” of Nicolás Maduro for not having accelerated the deportation of the “violent criminals” that, according to him, Caracas sent to the United States and that they should have been repatriated “at a fast pace.”
In his publication, the president said he had decided to revoke the concessions granted in November 2022 by the Biden government, which allowed Chevron to increase their production in Venezuela and export oil from the South American country.
At that time, the Biden administration authorized oil exports with the hope of getting guarantees for the elections that Venezuela celebrated in July last year and in which Maduro was proclaimed winner, although many countries – including the United States – consider that the winner was the opponent Edmundo González Urrutia.
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“We are reversing the concessions that the corrupt Joe Biden granted to Nicolás Maduro, of Venezuela, in the agreement on oil transactions of November 26, 2022, as well as those related to the electoral conditions within Venezuela, that the Maduro regime has not complied with,” Trump announced.
The president also assured that he had ordered that the agreement end “as of March 1, without renewal option.”
Under the terms of the current license, granted by the Biden government, Chevron had allowed to operate in Venezuela until the end of July, so Trump’s decision advances the cessation of the activity in several months.
Chevron’s departure is an economic setback for Venezuela, since the American oil company had contributed to the reactivation of the oil production of the Caribbean country, which in February this year, exceeded for the first time the million barrels per day (BPD) since June 2019, according to figures from the organization of oil export countries (OPEP).
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Chevron is the only great American oil company that operates in Venezuela. In association with Petróleos de Venezuela SA (PDVSA), it reached a production of more than 200,000 barrels per day in 2024, according to data from the US Congress Research Service (CRS), an independent analysis agency.
The license that Biden granted Chevron in 2022 allowed the oil company to expand its production range in Venezuela. However, the company decided not to compromise more capital due to the temporal nature of the permit and, in the last two years, it has focused mainly on the repair of wells and oil facilities.
Last week, Trump had already suggested in press statements to revoke the license that allowed Chevron to operate in Venezuela.
The Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, had also criticized the license, considering it a key source of dollar financing for the Maduro government.
There is no threat to intimidate Venezuela: Maduro
Nicolás Maduro, who swore in January for a third term in Venezuela, after his questioned re -election last year, said Wednesday that “there is no threat in the world that intimidates” the country, and warned people who ask for “aggressions” against the nation that justice will “come to them.”
In an act in Caracas transmitted by the Venezuelan state television channel (VTV), the leader of Chavismo said that no “threat” can intimidate “the will of the people of Venezuela to move towards their independence, towards their freedom and towards their maximum happiness.”
“That nobody is wrong with Venezuela, nobody, nobody is wrong with Venezuela, and the fascists who ask for aggressions against our country justice will come to them. (…) Venezuela is not attacking, Venezuela is not touched, Venezuela is respected, ”said Maduro.
Maduro, who did not mention Trump’s decision, said that Venezuela has recovered thanks to a “great effort.”
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In addition, he said that “the economic recovery and the construction of a new model do not depend on anyone in this world”, but on the citizens of the Caribbean country, which has taken its “own path.”
Experts also foresee that the cessation of transnational operations affects the entry of foreign exchange of the oil nation, used, to a large extent, to contain the price of the dollar and inflation, since the vast majority of the goods – and some services – are quoted based on the US currency.
The Chavista administration “categorically” rejected the measure, which he described as “harmful and inexplicable”, and said that Venezuela “will follow its path of integral economic recovery” with “the creative effort of all.”
With EFE information
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