United States Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum has met with Venezuela’s interim President Delcy Rodriguez in Caracas, as part of a push from US President Donald Trump to ramp up oil and mineral production in the South American country.
On Wednesday, the meeting culminated with the announcement that Rodriguez would submit a proposal to reform Venezuela’s mining laws to the country’s legislature in the coming days.
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Burgum also expressed optimism that economic relations between the US and Venezuela would continue to tighten.
“The opportunities for collaboration and synergy between our two great countries of Venezuela and the United States are unlimited,” he said.
He added that he was accompanied on his two-day trip by representatives from nearly a dozen companies seeking access to Venezuela’s oil and minerals.
“They are eager to get started, and they are eager to cut the red tape to allow that capital investment to flow,” Burgum said.
Claiming Venezuelan resources
The growing economic ties between Venezuela and the US come in the wake of a January 3 military operation to abduct and imprison Venezuela’s former leader, Nicolas Maduro.
The military operation was criticised as a violation of Venezuelan sovereignty. Experts from the United Nations, for instance, described the incident as a “grave, manifest and deliberate violation of the most fundamental principles of international law”.
But in the months since the military attack, the Trump administration has sought to give private enterprises greater access to Venezuela’s natural resources, some of which were nationalised.
Trump himself has claimed that the US has a right to Venezuelan oil, as a result of early petroleum exploration in the country. He called the nationalisation push in Venezuela “the greatest theft in the history of America”.
Venezuela not only has some of the largest oil reserves in the world but also substantial deposits of gold, copper, diamonds, coltan and other minerals.
Burgum acknowledged the wealth of resources in his remarks on Wednesday.
“Venezuela is a rich, rich country filled with both oil and gas resources, but also rich in critical minerals,” he added.
Collaboration or exploitation?
But critics have questioned whether the US is exploiting Venezuela for its own economic gain.
International law, for example, has established that each country has permanent sovereignty over its “natural wealth and resources”. Violations of that principle, under the law, amount to an infringement of the right to self-determination.
Advocates have also pointed out that the Rodriguez administration has faced threats from Trump to act in accordance with his wishes.
In an interview with The Atlantic magazine in January, for instance, Trump warned that if Rodriguez “doesn’t do what’s right, she is going to pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro”.
Already, in late January, Rodriguez signed into law a reform to expand private investment in Venezuela’s state-controlled oil industry, satisfying one of Trump’s primary demands.
Her government has also transferred at least 50 million barrels of Venezuelan oil to the Trump administration to sell, with Trump himself controlling how the proceeds are distributed.
Trump has been a vocal proponent of fossil fuel usage, having called climate change a “hoax” and a “scam”.
He has also praised Rodriguez for her cooperation, citing her administration as a model for other governments, including Iran’s.
In a social media post on Wednesday, Trump reiterated his satisfaction with Rodriguez’s job performance so far.
“Delcy Rodriguez, who is the President of Venezuela, is doing a great job, and working with US Representatives very well,” Trump wrote.
“The Oil is beginning to flow, and the professionalism and dedication between both countries is a very nice thing to see.”
The US diplomatic mission in Venezuela, meanwhile, characterised Burgum’s two-day visit as a “vital and historic step” in a “three-phase plan” to benefit both countries.
It noted the US and Venezuela would “work for a legitimate mining sector and safe critical mineral supply chains”.
Due to poor economic conditions in Venezuela, an informal mining sector has developed, lacking oversight and regulations. That can make working conditions treacherous. Just last October, heavy rainfall caused a gold mine to collapse, killing 14 people.