Iran, Venezuela found kinship in anti-American ideology, evading U.S. sanctions
On Saturday, Iran, a nation with few close friends and many mounting challenges, suddenly lost one of its closest allies in Latin America when the United States attacked Venezuela and captured its president, Nicolás Maduro.
Iran and Venezuela, both oil-rich countries under U.S. sanctions, had forged close political and economic ties over the past two decades, finding kinship in anti-American ideology and in helping one another evade those sanctions.
Iranian leaders and political figures often boasted that Iran had managed to infiltrate “America’s backyard,” with its presence and influence in Venezuela. That presence included billions of dollars of Iranian investment in Venezuela’s oil and energy sector, housing developments and various industrial projects, many with little to no financial return.
Iran shipped Venezuela 25 million barrels of oil and gasoline products, totaling about $2.5 billion, between 2021 and 2023, according to Kpler, a global firm that tracks and documents petroleum shipping.
Iranian news media reported that Venezuela owed Iran about $2 billion, for both the oil and gasoline products as well as repayments for some investments in other sectors.
Iran’s Ministry of Oil had also signed contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars to repair two of Venezuela’s largest refineries, and teams of Iranian engineers were still present and working at those sites, said Homayoun Falakshahi, Kpler’s head of crude oil analysis and an expert on Iran and Venezuela’s energy sectors. Iran also sent equipment and spare parts for Venezuela’s refineries that had been near collapse, Falakshahi said.
“Iran and Venezuela’s relationship has two components,” said Falakshahi, first, the highly politically symbolic ties, and, second, those in the oil and energy sector. “They learned from each other in terms of sanctions evasion, all the techniques to make sure oil trade and logistics under sanctions were optimized.”
Venezuela’s debt to Iran, no small amount considering Iran’s financial and economic crisis and the raging protests it is helping fuel, will likely not be paid. Several Iranian news media outlets over the weekend criticized Iran’s policies in Venezuela, saying they had been politically motivated and had wasted resources that belonged to the Iranian public.
“The result is high-risk interactions, piling up debt that today its payment is highly doubtful,” wrote Eghtesaad 24, an Iranian economic news site. Tabnak, a conservative outlet, warned that if America takes control of Venezuela, any repayments to Iran could be completely abandoned.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio told “Face the Nation” on CBS News on Sunday that one of the reasons the United States had removed Maduro, in addition to his alleged involvement with drug cartels, was because he had invited Washington’s adversaries — like Iran — to gain a foothold in Latin America.
Iran publicly condemned the U.S. intervention in Venezuela in a statement issued by the Foreign Ministry, saying that abducting Maduro was a violation of the country’s sovereignty and international law.
Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on his social media page that he had spoken to his Venezuelan counterpart and had reiterated Tehran’s strong support for the country and its people. Araghchi said Iran’s ambassador and diplomatic staff were conducting their work in Caracas without disruption.
“The removal of Maduro is clearly a blow to Iran’s footprint, but I don’t think this would mean that Iran has been completely eradicated,” said Sina Azodi, director of the Middle East Studies Program and an Iran expert at George Washington University. “Even with this, Iran will try to expand relations with other leftist countries in Latin America who one way or another oppose the United States and will try to have cordial relations with the next government of Venezuela.”
Iran and Venezuela also had modest military ties. According to the Venezuelan Defense Ministry and U.S. officials, in 2007 Venezuela began purchasing kits to make an Iranian drone, the Mohajer-2. They were assembled by the Venezuelan state-owned weapons company CAVIM, and in July 2022 Maduro displayed armed Iranian combat drones built using the kits.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
