Last Chevron-chartered vessel starts to return oil cargo in Venezuela, data and source say
It would be the last tanker to return its cargo following state company PDVSA's order to return the crude amid payment uncertainty related to U.S. sanctions.
The Marshall Islands-flagged vessel, Dubai Attraction, on Thursday entered a berth in Amuay terminal, Venezuela, to start discharging the cargo it originally intended to export, LSEG shipping data showed.
Chevron and PDVSA did not immediately reply to requests for comment.
Venezuela's Vice President Delcy Rodriguez, who is also the OPEC country's oil minister, has blamed the U.S. measures for the issue, saying they prevented Chevron from paying for the oil.
Venezuela's oil exports fell almost 20% in April to 700,000 barrels per day, the lowest in nine months, due to the cargo cancellations. Chevron's exports of Venezuelan crude to the U.S. plummeted 69% to some 66,000 bpd due to PDVSA's measures.
Some tankers Chevron had chartered to move crude from Venezuela to the U.S. were marketed for spot contracts elsewhere, sources said last week. This signaled that Chevron does not expect to load all the cargoes it typically ships from Venezuela even if it eventually finds a way to resolve the disagreement with PDVSA.
In March, President Donald Trump's administration revoked a license issued in 2022 by the U.S. Treasury Department for Chevron to operate in Venezuela. The May deadline was granted to wind down operations and oil exports.
The same deadline was granted to other partners of PDVSA, including Eni, Repsol, Maurel & Prom and Reliance Industries, to wind down oil cargoes bound for Europe and Asia.
Tankers chartered by trading house Vitol were loading and discharging normally at Venezuelan ports, according to the data and documents, while vessels chartered by Reliance Industries for India delivery and Maurel & Prom for Europe departed on schedule last week, ahead of the May 27 deadline to wind down cargoes and operations.
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CNN
43 minutes ago
- CNN
Despite Trump's tough tone now, things were much worse in Washington when National Guard was rolled out in 1968
Donald Trump Federal agencies US militaryFacebookTweetLink Follow Fear in the streets. Buildings burning. Law enforcement struggling to tamp down violence and control chaos. It's the kind of scene that has brought a federal military response to US cities in the past. And it's a vision of Washington, DC, that President Donald Trump is invoking to bring the military to the city's streets today. 'It's becoming a situation of complete and total lawlessness,' Trump said in a news conference last week, announcing his plans to federalize law enforcement in the capital – including the deployment of 800 National Guard troops. While the government has announced some arrests this week – many of them immigration offenses – the scene in Washington has been a far cry from the description Trump gave when announcing the federal law enforcement takeover, saying the District 'has been overtaken by violent gangs and bloodthirsty criminals.' Since their arrival this week, members of the guard have spent much of their time posted near landmarks and standing next to armored vehicles, amiably obliging tourists who request selfies. It's a noticeably different situation than the chaotic one that prompted the biggest military callup in Washington since the Civil War – the 1968 riots following the assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., in Tennessee. 'You saw smoke, and you saw flames. And you see cars speeding by. 'There's a riot! The city's burning!'' said Brig Owens in a 2014 interview for an oral history project. Owens, who died in 2022, was a player for Washington's NFL team who was called up for active duty with the guard during the riots. 'It was as if war had come to the city. At least for a small kid, that's the way it felt,' Washington, DC, historian John DeFerrari, who was 10 years old at the time, told CNN. 'I remember being out and playing in the front yard of our house and seeing a military Jeep come by on patrol. Two soldiers there. A machine gun mounted.' To hear the president tell it, the situation in Washington is just as dire today. 'People are so happy to see our military going into DC and getting these thugs out,' Trump said. But many local elected officials are expressing less enthusiasm for the federal action and the impression the president is giving of the District. 'One thing that has everybody pretty mad, especially me, is the characterization of our city and our residents,' responded Mayor Muriel Bowser. 'We don't live in a dirty city. We don't have neighborhoods that should be bulldozed.' After spiking in 2023, violent crime in Washington has been on the decline, according to Metropolitan Police Department records. 'He's painted this dystopian vision, and it just doesn't track with the facts on the ground,' DC Councilmember Charles Allen told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Thursday. The National Guard was last mobilized in DC in 2020 during Black Lives Matter protests. Guard mmembers famously helped to clear out demonstrators as President Trump made his way across Lafayette Square to hold a Bible in front of a vandalized church. There has been a dispute over whether the guard was already planning to move protesters away from the White House or was specifically clearing a path for the president's photo opportunity. Before 2020, the guard and its predecessor – the DC Militia – were placed on federal active duty only 10 times in the District, according to the Congressional Research Service, including a multiyear deployment during the Civil War. The assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis on April 4, 1968, was a shock to the world. But it was felt as a shattering blow in Washington, which had the highest percentage of Black residents of any major US city at the time, according to The Washington Post. Paul Delaney, cofounder of the National Association of Black Journalists, was a reporter for The Washington Star newspaper at the time and knew the bottled-up rage of the community – already dealing with 'white flight' and underinvestment – could explode at the news. 'I drove up and sure enough, groups of protestors had formed on 14th Street near Pitts Motel,' Delaney, who is now 92 years old, told CNN. 'They began marching to U Street and began breaking windows, looting, etc. I marched with them, hiding my notebook so they wouldn't think I was a cop or some kind of spy. This went on through the night.' Within hours, businesses were in flames. Hundreds would ultimately be looted or torched, The New York Times reported, as fury over King's death expressed itself in the devastation of the several neighborhoods, including the historically Black community of Shaw. By the weekend, the DC National Guard was part of a deployment of more than 13,000 soldiers – most of them full-time Army and Marines – trying to bring the emotionally exhausted city under control. 'You had little mobs throughout the city, and you have to be aware of what those consequences could be if you get caught up in that mob,' Owens said. In contrast to the current administration, President Lyndon B. Johnson was reluctant to immediately bring the federal military onto the streets of the nation's capital, waiting a full day before invoking the Insurrection Act to mobilize troops. 'But then you had lots of destruction, lots of fires going on. Firemen were being harassed to some degree by the rioters,' said DeFerrari. 'So, the local police chief and the mayor said listen, we need federal help to control this situation.' Before calm was restored to the community after four days, more than 6,000 people were arrested, according to the National Archives, and 13 were dead. Most of the victims died in burned or collapsed buildings, The Washington Post reported. 'You had to be very careful walking through the various neighborhoods, and you didn't know if someone was going to throw something at you or if someone was going to take a shot at you,' Owens said. 'Very intense time.' After the violence was brought under control, President Johnson toured the damage from the air, Secret Service agent Clint Hill, then head of the president's protective detail, told The Washington Post in 2018. 'It was quite a sight to behold. It was unbelievable. A major portion of the city had actually burned, and it's something I'll never forget,' said Hill, who was was tragically familiar with witnessing tragic events. Only five years earlier, Hill had rescued Jacqueline Kennedy in a moving limousine after President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in a Dallas motorcade. '(The riots) left this pall over the community,' said DeFerrari. 'Devastation and a sense of the old community being lost, and what is the replacement of that?' It is the second time this year President Trump has posted guard members on the streets of a city whose leaders didn't ask for it. The president federalized 4,000 California National Guard troops in June in response to immigration protests in downtown Los Angeles that had turned confrontational with federal agents. Gov. Gavin Newsom sued the Trump administration, contesting Trump's legal ability to take over the state guard without an open 'rebellion' against the government. A judge is considering whether to declare that the president's action illegal following a three-day bench trial. But circumstances are much different in Washington, a federally controlled district that does not have the same constitutional protections as states. 'Yes, the president can deploy the National Guard in DC, and they are allowed to perform law enforcement functions,' said CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig. Still, even the president does not have unilateral control over the city. By law, Trump cannot extend his 30-day takeover of DC law enforcement without the approval of Congress, which is on its summer recess, unless he declares a national emergency. The District's attorney general, Brian Schwalb, filed suit against the Trump administration Friday, arguing the president has already exceeded his authority by trying to force the Metropolitan Police Department to accept a new 'emergency commissioner,' something Schwalb called a 'hostile takeover' of the department. It took decades of redevelopment and gentrification, but the communities left in ruins after the 1968 uprising now show no visible signs of the violence that upended the city. DC's Shaw neighborhood is now billed by the city's marketing organization as filled with 'cool local shops, foodie restaurants, concert halls and African American history.' Row houses in what were once considered dangerous streets now sell for more than a million dollars. For those who have seen the devastation and rebuilding of the city up close, the decision to call in the military now is especially troubling. 'I think there very clearly is not an emergency in many Washingtonians' minds,' said DeFerrari. 'I think many Washingtonians think that this is quite unnecessary.'
CNN
an hour ago
- CNN
Despite Trump's tough tone now, things were much worse in Washington when National Guard was rolled out in 1968
Donald Trump Federal agencies US militaryFacebookTweetLink Follow Fear in the streets. Buildings burning. Law enforcement struggling to tamp down violence and control chaos. It's the kind of scene that has brought a federal military response to US cities in the past. And it's a vision of Washington, DC, that President Donald Trump is invoking to bring the military to the city's streets today. 'It's becoming a situation of complete and total lawlessness,' Trump said in a news conference last week, announcing his plans to federalize law enforcement in the capital – including the deployment of 800 National Guard troops. While the government has announced some arrests this week – many of them immigration offenses – the scene in Washington has been a far cry from the description Trump gave when announcing the federal law enforcement takeover, saying the District 'has been overtaken by violent gangs and bloodthirsty criminals.' Since their arrival this week, members of the guard have spent much of their time posted near landmarks and standing next to armored vehicles, amiably obliging tourists who request selfies. It's a noticeably different situation than the chaotic one that prompted the biggest military callup in Washington since the Civil War – the 1968 riots following the assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., in Tennessee. 'You saw smoke, and you saw flames. And you see cars speeding by. 'There's a riot! The city's burning!'' said Brig Owens in a 2014 interview for an oral history project. Owens, who died in 2022, was a player for Washington's NFL team who was called up for active duty with the guard during the riots. 'It was as if war had come to the city. At least for a small kid, that's the way it felt,' Washington, DC, historian John DeFerrari, who was 10 years old at the time, told CNN. 'I remember being out and playing in the front yard of our house and seeing a military Jeep come by on patrol. Two soldiers there. A machine gun mounted.' To hear the president tell it, the situation in Washington is just as dire today. 'People are so happy to see our military going into DC and getting these thugs out,' Trump said. But many local elected officials are expressing less enthusiasm for the federal action and the impression the president is giving of the District. 'One thing that has everybody pretty mad, especially me, is the characterization of our city and our residents,' responded Mayor Muriel Bowser. 'We don't live in a dirty city. We don't have neighborhoods that should be bulldozed.' After spiking in 2023, violent crime in Washington has been on the decline, according to Metropolitan Police Department records. 'He's painted this dystopian vision, and it just doesn't track with the facts on the ground,' DC Councilmember Charles Allen told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Thursday. The National Guard was last mobilized in DC in 2020 during Black Lives Matter protests. Guard mmembers famously helped to clear out demonstrators as President Trump made his way across Lafayette Square to hold a Bible in front of a vandalized church. There has been a dispute over whether the guard was already planning to move protesters away from the White House or was specifically clearing a path for the president's photo opportunity. Before 2020, the guard and its predecessor – the DC Militia – were placed on federal active duty only 10 times in the District, according to the Congressional Research Service, including a multiyear deployment during the Civil War. The assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis on April 4, 1968, was a shock to the world. But it was felt as a shattering blow in Washington, which had the highest percentage of Black residents of any major US city at the time, according to The Washington Post. Paul Delaney, cofounder of the National Association of Black Journalists, was a reporter for The Washington Star newspaper at the time and knew the bottled-up rage of the community – already dealing with 'white flight' and underinvestment – could explode at the news. 'I drove up and sure enough, groups of protestors had formed on 14th Street near Pitts Motel,' Delaney, who is now 92 years old, told CNN. 'They began marching to U Street and began breaking windows, looting, etc. I marched with them, hiding my notebook so they wouldn't think I was a cop or some kind of spy. This went on through the night.' Within hours, businesses were in flames. Hundreds would ultimately be looted or torched, The New York Times reported, as fury over King's death expressed itself in the devastation of the several neighborhoods, including the historically Black community of Shaw. By the weekend, the DC National Guard was part of a deployment of more than 13,000 soldiers – most of them full-time Army and Marines – trying to bring the emotionally exhausted city under control. 'You had little mobs throughout the city, and you have to be aware of what those consequences could be if you get caught up in that mob,' Owens said. In contrast to the current administration, President Lyndon B. Johnson was reluctant to immediately bring the federal military onto the streets of the nation's capital, waiting a full day before invoking the Insurrection Act to mobilize troops. 'But then you had lots of destruction, lots of fires going on. Firemen were being harassed to some degree by the rioters,' said DeFerrari. 'So, the local police chief and the mayor said listen, we need federal help to control this situation.' Before calm was restored to the community after four days, more than 6,000 people were arrested, according to the National Archives, and 13 were dead. Most of the victims died in burned or collapsed buildings, The Washington Post reported. 'You had to be very careful walking through the various neighborhoods, and you didn't know if someone was going to throw something at you or if someone was going to take a shot at you,' Owens said. 'Very intense time.' After the violence was brought under control, President Johnson toured the damage from the air, Secret Service agent Clint Hill, then head of the president's protective detail, told The Washington Post in 2018. 'It was quite a sight to behold. It was unbelievable. A major portion of the city had actually burned, and it's something I'll never forget,' said Hill, who was was tragically familiar with witnessing tragic events. Only five years earlier, Hill had rescued Jacqueline Kennedy in a moving limousine after President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in a Dallas motorcade. '(The riots) left this pall over the community,' said DeFerrari. 'Devastation and a sense of the old community being lost, and what is the replacement of that?' It is the second time this year President Trump has posted guard members on the streets of a city whose leaders didn't ask for it. The president federalized 4,000 California National Guard troops in June in response to immigration protests in downtown Los Angeles that had turned confrontational with federal agents. Gov. Gavin Newsom sued the Trump administration, contesting Trump's legal ability to take over the state guard without an open 'rebellion' against the government. A judge is considering whether to declare that the president's action illegal following a three-day bench trial. But circumstances are much different in Washington, a federally controlled district that does not have the same constitutional protections as states. 'Yes, the president can deploy the National Guard in DC, and they are allowed to perform law enforcement functions,' said CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig. Still, even the president does not have unilateral control over the city. By law, Trump cannot extend his 30-day takeover of DC law enforcement without the approval of Congress, which is on its summer recess, unless he declares a national emergency. The District's attorney general, Brian Schwalb, filed suit against the Trump administration Friday, arguing the president has already exceeded his authority by trying to force the Metropolitan Police Department to accept a new 'emergency commissioner,' something Schwalb called a 'hostile takeover' of the department. It took decades of redevelopment and gentrification, but the communities left in ruins after the 1968 uprising now show no visible signs of the violence that upended the city. DC's Shaw neighborhood is now billed by the city's marketing organization as filled with 'cool local shops, foodie restaurants, concert halls and African American history.' Row houses in what were once considered dangerous streets now sell for more than a million dollars. For those who have seen the devastation and rebuilding of the city up close, the decision to call in the military now is especially troubling. 'I think there very clearly is not an emergency in many Washingtonians' minds,' said DeFerrari. 'I think many Washingtonians think that this is quite unnecessary.'
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Trump says he'll know if Putin wants peace deal with Ukraine in their meeting
US President Donald Trump said Monday that he expected to determine, moments into his meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Alaska this Friday, whether it would be possible to work out a deal to end the war in Ukraine. Speaking at a White House press briefing, Trump said, 'At the end of that meeting, probably the first two minutes, I'll know exactly whether or not a deal can be made'. He said he thought Friday's sitdown with Putin in Alaska would be 'really a feel-out meeting,' adding that 'it'll be good, but it might be bad'. It could be 'Lots of luck, keep fighting. Or I may say, we can make a deal.' Trump said. Without elaborating, Trump reiterated that land exchanges might be a part of any significant agreement. Friday's meeting at the request of Putin comes as Trump presses for a ceasefire that has remained out of reach in the Russian invasion of Ukraine and as European allies pushed for Ukraine's involvement, fearful that discussions could otherwise favour Moscow. Trump returns to criticising Zelenskyy On Monday, Trump seemed to duck repeated chances to say that he would push for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to take part in his discussions with Putin. Trump, who has harshly criticised both leaders after promising — and so far failing — to swiftly end the conflict, gave much of his criticism to Zelenskyy again. According to Trump, Zelenskyy had been to 'a lot of meetings' without managing to halt a war that Russia started. Trump said that Zelenskyy had been in power for the duration of the war and 'nothing happened' during that time, contrasting him with Putin, who has wielded power in Russia for decades. He then said, after he meets with Putin, 'The next meeting will be with Zelenskyy and Putin', but it could also be a meeting with 'Putin and Zelenskyy and me.' The US leader's eagerness to reach a deal has raised fears in Ukraine and Europe about such an agreement favouring Russia at the detriment of Ukraine. EU leaders wary of Trump-Putin meeting Earlier on Monday, EU foreign ministers called for "transatlantic unity" to back Ukraine and put further pressure on Russia. And in a joint statement issued over the weekend, the leaders of Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, the UK, and the European Commission rejected Putin's ceasefire proposal to trade the Ukrainian territories of Donetsk and Luhansk. They stated that "the current line of contact should be the starting point of negotiations" and stressed that they "are united as Europeans and determined to jointly promote our interests". EU leaders also reiterated that "the path to peace in Ukraine cannot be decided without Ukraine." To that point, Trump on Monday said he would call Zelenskyy and European leaders after his discussion with Putin to 'tell them what kind of a deal — I'm not going to make a deal. It's not up to me to make a deal.' Trump's up-and-down relations with Putin More recently, Trump has expressed frustration with Putin that Russia hasn't appeared to take a push for a ceasefire more seriously, and softened his tone toward Zelenskyy. But his comments on Monday suggested he might have had another change of heart. 'President Putin invited me to get involved,' Trump said. He noted that he thought it was 'very respectful' that Putin is coming to the US for Friday's meeting, instead of insisting that Trump go to Russia. 'I'd like to see a ceasefire. I'd like to see the best deal that can be made for both parties,' Trump said. Related Zelenskyy tries to warn Trump not to trust Putin ahead of Alaska meeting EU calls for 'transatlantic unity' ahead of Trump-Putin summit in Alaska Meanwhile, Trump on Monday hinted that if Friday's summit goes well, he might see a time when trade between the United States and Russia returns to normal, a sharp contrast to his warnings of more economic sanctions. However, it remains unclear if Russia will follow through by withdrawing its forces from Ukraine as analysts expect Putin to be unwavering in his demands to keep all the territory his forces now occupy and to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO. Zelenskyy, for his part, has maintained he will never consent to any formal Russian annexation of Ukrainian territory or give up a bid for NATO membership.
