US concerns over India buying Venezuelan oil have been addressed

Washington: US National Security Adviser John Bolton indicated on Friday that their concerns regarding India continuing to buy oil from Venezuela have been resolved.

The issue came up for discussion during a telephonic conversation between Bolton and his Indian counterpart Ajit Doval regarding the terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir. Earlier this week, Bolton had said that countries “will not be forgotten” for buying oil from Venezuela.

"Nations and firms that support (President Nicolas) Maduro's theft of Venezuelan resources will not be forgotten," he had said in a tweet that displayed a news story about Venezuelan Oil Minister Manuel Quevedo visiting India to sell more oil.

"The US will continue to use all of its powers to preserve the Venezuelan people's assets and we encourage all nations to do the same,” Bolton said in a tweet on Friday.

Responding to a question about his tweet and the consequences that countries like India could face for continuing to purchase oil from Venezuela, Bolton indicated that the issue might have already been resolved.

"I don't think it's a question about what the consequences would be because they (countries like India) may take actions that cuts off these purchases of the Venezuelan oil,” he said.

“I would just note that today Trafigura, one of the two largest private world trading concerns that deals a lot with Venezuela, has announced they will no longer deal in Venezuela in the world oil. And they were one of the trading firms that sold to oil firms in India. So that may be an indication that problem is solving itself right now,” he said.

Bolton said the combined economic and political pressure from the US and other countries on the Nicolas Maduro regime was having an effect.

“It makes it very different from what has happened in the past 20 years of the Chavez-Maduro regime. We've got over 50 governments worldwide that now recognize (opposition leader) Juan Guaido as the legitimate president. That's never happened before,” he said.

The US NSA said he spoke to Doval twice recently including on Friday. He said they talked a "little bit about Venezuela" but the main topic was the Pulwama terror attack.