Avertizări OFAC Venezuela

Anunț: Ca urmare a evenimentelor ce au avut loc, în ultima perioadă, în Venezuela, OFAC a înaintat mai multe mesaje de informare / avertizare privind anumite tipuri de tranzacții cu companiile activând în sectorul resurselor minerale în Venezuela.

  • Foreign governments and foreign private sector companies play a critical role in determining how long the illegitimate and repressive Maduro regime is able to maintain control of Venezuela’s natural resources.
  • Finished gasoline imports and the gasoline additives that PDVSA requires to refine gasoline are essential for the regime’s staying power.  Those providing it help prolong Maduro’s dictatorship and as a result, the suffering it has created for the Venezuelan people.
  • The U.S. Secretary of the Treasury has identified the Venezuelan oil sector as subject to sanctions.  Treasury can sanction any entity that provides financial or technological support for, or goods or services to, PDVSA.
  • Foreign entities face significant sanctions risk if they continue making payments to PDVSA for Venezuelan crude.  Instead, such entities should immediately begin depositing such payments into blocked accounts the former Maduro regime cannot access.  This revenue must be preserved for the benefit of the interim Guaidó government or a democratically elected successor.
  • For instance, on March 11, Treasury designated the Russian/Venezuelan bank Evrofinance Mosnarbank, which materially assisted, sponsored, or provided financial or technological support for, or goods and services in support of, PDVSA. 
  • Foreign entities could face sanctions risk if they provide diluent, including light oil or naphtha, to PDVSA.  Diluent is required to dilute Venezuelan extra-heavy crude during oil production and transportation and is an essential part of the production process.  
  • In addition, foreign entities could face potential sanctions risk if they do not cease transactions of gasoline and gasoline additives to PDVSA.
  • Swap or barter arrangements for crude oil involving gasoline, gasoline additives, or diluent are also potentially sanctionable
  • Currently, this policy is focused on gasoline and refinery inputs (gasoline additives) used for the production of gasoline in recognition of the key role gasoline plays in maintaining support for the former Maduro regime.  This therefore does not extend to the trade in other refined fuels such as diesel fuel, jet fuel, and kerosene.