US pressures oil corporations to invest in Venezuela
6 January 10:40
White House officials have made it clear to U.S. oil executives that if they want to be compensated for assets expropriated by Venezuela about twenty years ago, they will have to quickly return to the country and invest significant capital in rebuilding the destroyed oil industry
This was reported by Reuters, according to "Komersant Ukrainian".
In the 2000s, Venezuela nationalized the assets of a number of international oil companies that refused to give the state-owned PDVSA broader operational control, as demanded by the late President Hugo Chavez.
The American oil giant Chevron was one of the few companies that agreed to stay in Venezuela and create joint ventures with PDVSA. Instead, competitors Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips left the country and filed lawsuits in international arbitration.
US President Donald Trump said on Saturday that American companies are ready to return to Venezuela and invest in reviving the country’s moribund oil industry, hours after President Nicolas Maduro was captured and taken away by the US military.
In recent discussions with oil executives in the event of Maduro’s removal from power, officials have emphasized that it is up to American companies to finance the rebuilding of Venezuela’s oil infrastructure at their own expense. Only this will be one of the prerequisites for further reimbursement of debts for old expropriations.
For companies like ConocoPhillips, this will mean very expensive investments, sources say. For years, Conoco has been trying to recover about $12 billion lost as a result of the nationalization of its Venezuelan assets under Chavez. Exxon Mobil has also filed international arbitration lawsuits, trying to recover about $1.65 billion.
Trump began publicly reminding of Venezuelan expropriations when he ordered a blockade of sanctioned tankers carrying Venezuelan oil last month.
