Venezuelan official Diosdado Cabello denounced the United States seizure of the oil tanker MT Skipper as an attempt to steal Venezuelan oil, gold, and gas, dismissing US claims of links to Aragua Train drug trafficking as 'pure nonsense,' in comments reported by Alberto Rodolfo News on X during the 59-minute window ending at 1:16 a.m. UTC on December 11, 2025. Cabello further stated that Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado 'left the country without drama,' describing the surrounding mystery as 'an exercise in political marketing' to monopolize media attention, according to the same Alberto Rodolfo News report on X in the reporting window. Maritime analyst Sal Mercoglianos reported on X that MT Skipper is now underway heading northeast just south of Grenada, noting the vessel's operations over the past year from Guyana to Oman, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Sri Lanka, Iraq, and the UAE. TankerTrackers.com shared a high-resolution image of the tanker from Planet Labs during the same period. A photograph posted by SA_Defensa on X showed the USS San Antonio in El Tuque, Ponce, Puerto Rico, at 3:20 p.m. on December 10, 2025, credited to Sarabel Rosado. The comments follow the US agencies' seizure of MT Skipper off Venezuela's coast on December 10 for transporting sanctioned oil, as confirmed by Bloomberg reporter Jennifer Jacobs, and prior denunciations from Venezuela's foreign ministry and President Nicolás Maduro.
