US naval forces have boarded and seized a runaway Russian shadow fleet tanker in the North Atlantic, the latest in a series of moves by Washington against vessels linked to illegal trade in Venezuelan oil. The US European Command said in a statement on social media on January 7 that the tanker, the Marinera, formerly named the Bella 1, was seized in the north Atlantic Ocean between Iceland and the United Kingdom.
Venezuela's economy may be in tatters, but it is sitting on the world's largest known oil reserves, estimated at more than 300 billion barrels. It can safely be assumed that these mineral resources also play a role in the strategic considerations of the oil-friendly US president, Donald Trump. For his Venezuelan counterpart, Nicolas Maduro, they act as a lubricant for foreign relations. But the intensification of the US conflict with Venezuela cannot be explained by oil alone.
Behind his desk in his office, the secretary general of the Organization of American States (OAS), Albert Ramdin, 67, has three portraits hanging like guardians: Mahatma Gandhi, champion of nonviolence; Martin Luther King Jr., fighter for civil rights; and Nelson Mandela, advocate of dialogue with one's enemies. Their example inspires this former Surinamese foreign minister, who has spent most of his career in this multilateral organization.
Dominican Republic forces have seized hundreds of cocaine packages from a speedboat that was targeted and destroyed by the United States Navy, officials said, amid escalating anti-drug operations in the Caribbean. In a post on X on Sunday, the Dominican Republic's National Directorate for Drug Control (DNCD), the country's drug enforcement agency, said it carried out a joint Dominican-US operation in which they said they recovered 1,000kg (2,200lb) of cocaine in 377 packages.