The Trump administration will soon allow Venezuela to sell oil now subject to American sanctionswhose revenues are initially spent on basic government services such as policing and health care and are subject to oversight from Washington, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday.
The United States will maintain control in the short term to ensure that oil revenues are used to stabilize Venezuela, Rubio said at a news conference. Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing. He noted that the South American country’s interim leaders will present each month “a budget” of what they need funding for.
“The funds from these oil sales will be deposited into an account that we will monitor,” Rubio said, adding that the U.S. Treasury would monitor the process. Venezuela, he said, “will spend this money for the benefit of the Venezuelan people.”
Rubio offered new insight into how the United States plans to handle the crisis. sale of tens of millions of barrels of oil of Venezuela, which has the largest proven crude reserves in the world, and oversee where the money flows. After the United States raid that captured then-president Nicolas Maduro this month, the United States is working to influence the next steps in the South American country with its vast oil resources.
The United States will not subsidize oil industry investments in Venezuela, Rubio said, and will only oversee the sale of sanctioned oil on an “intermediary basis.”
“This is simply a way to divide revenue to avoid systemic collapse while we work through this recovery and transition,” Rubio said.
Democrats and some Republicans on the committee pressed Rubio for more details on Trump’s plans for Venezuelan oil. Sen. Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut, asked Rubio for assurances that the sale of Venezuelan oil will be fair and open, not rigged for profit oil companies allied with Trump.
“You take their oil at gunpoint, you hold and sell that oil… you decide how and for what purposes that money is going to be used in a country of 30 million people,” Murphy said. “I think a lot of us think this is doomed to failure.”
Under Maduro, Rubio has said Venezuela’s oil industry benefits the country’s corrupt leaders and countries like China, which bought Venezuelan oil at a reduced price. Today, Venezuela’s interim leaders are helping the United States seize illegal oil shipments, he said.
The United States will give Venezuela’s current leaders instructions on how the money can and cannot be spent and conduct audits to ensure it is used as intended, Rubio said. He said Venezuela could use the money to pay for police services or buy medicine.
The fund was initially created in Qatar to avoid having the funds seized by U.S. creditors and because of other legal complications related to the fact that the United States does not view Maduro’s government as legitimate, Rubio said.
Hundreds of millions of dollars have already been set aside and up to $3 billion more is expected, he said.
“It’s an account that belongs to Venezuela, but it’s blocked by U.S. sanctions,” Rubio said. “We only control the distribution of the money, we do not control the money itself.”
Earlier this month, Venezuelan interim President Delcy Rodríguez said cash from oil sales would go to two sovereign funds: one to support crisis-hit health services and a second to strengthen public infrastructure, including the electricity grid.
The country’s hospitals are so poorly equipped that patients are asked to provide the equipment needed for their care, from syringes to surgical screws. They also have to pay for laboratory and imaging tests at private hospitals.
On Tuesday, during a televised event to announce the renovation of various health facilities, Rodríguez said his government and the U.S. administration “have established respectful and courteous channels of communication” since Maduro’s capture.
Neither Rodríguez nor his government’s press office immediately commented on Rubio’s comments Wednesday.
At Rodríguez’s request, Venezuelan lawmakers last week began debating a revision of the country’s energy law. The proposed changes aim to create the conditions necessary to attract much-needed private foreign investment.
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Garcia Cano reported from Caracas, Venezuela.
