US military forces have boarded a sanctioned oil tanker in the Indian Ocean, the Pentagon announced on Sunday, marking the latest operation targeting illicit oil linked to Venezuela.
The vessel, identified as the Veronica III, is a Panamanian-flagged tanker listed under US sanctions related to Iran, according to the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control. The Pentagon confirmed that US troops executed “a right-of-visit, maritime interdiction and boarding” overnight.
Donald Trump ordered a quarantine of sanctioned tankers in December to exert pressure on then-President Nicolás Maduro, who was later captured in January during an American military operation. The Pentagon stated: “The vessel tried to defy President Trump’s quarantine – hoping to slip away. We tracked it from the Caribbean to the Indian Ocean, closed the distance, and shut it down.”
This incident follows the boarding of another tanker, the Aquila II, last week in the same region. That vessel is currently being held while the US determines its ultimate fate, a defence official said. The Aquila II, also Panamanian-flagged, is under sanctions related to the shipment of illicit Russian oil.
Samir Madani, co-founder of TankerTrackers.com, said at least 16 tankers departed the Venezuelan coast last month after US forces captured Maduro. The Aquila II had been tracked using satellite imagery and had spent much of the past year with its transponder turned off, a practice known as “running dark”.
