Report: Venezuela Plotted to Sell Sanctioned Syrian Oil in the U.S.

Breitbart: Bloomberg Politics reported Wednesday on a “previously undisclosed,” and fortunately never executed, plan by Venezuela to evade international sanctions and slip banned Syrian oil into the United States for sale.

The idea was to use a Russian shell company to help Venezuela purchase Syrian oil at a discounted price. The oil would then be refined at Citgo’s facility in Aruba and distributed to gas stations in the United States and elsewhere.

The plan reportedly went well beyond blue-sky discussions. Bloomberg Politics describes a substantial volume of email correspondence between Syrian and Venezuelan officials, including executives at Citgo, which is the U.S. subsidiary of Venezuela’s state-owned petroleum and natural gas company.

One of those documents was a 2012 letter to Syria’s ambassador to Venezuela from Venezuelan oil trade Wilmer Ruperti, who explicitly stated the goal of avoiding “the boycott that has been implemented by the United States of America and the European Community.”  more here