Venezuelan oil is hidden en route to China, bypassing US sanctions

Tankers leaving Venezuela loaded with PDVSA crude did not travel straight to China as they had in the past. Instead, 15 tankers whose routes were reviewed by Reuters left Venezuela and first headed for the coast of Malaysia, tracking data show. A few miles offshore, in the Malacca Strait, each rendezvoused with a second, empty tanker that had pulled alongside. (File pic show China's President Xi Jinping (R) speaks with Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro in front of a statue of Venezuela's late president Hugo Chavez. - Reuters)

CARACAS/MEXICO CITY: Last year, China replaced the United States as the No. 1 importer of oil from Venezuela, yet another front in the heated rivalry between Washington and Beijing.

The United States had imposed sanctions on Venezuela's state-owned oil company as part of a bid to topple that country's socialist president, Nicolas Maduro. U.S. refineries stopped buying Venezuelan crude. Caracas' ally China, long a major customer, suddenly found itself the top purchaser. Through the first six months of 2019, it imported an average of 350,000 barrels per day of crude from Venezuela.