Tanker carrying oil from Mexico reaches Cuba, increasing tensions with US

Mexico has become a key supplier of oil to Cuba after Venezuela's exports fell, drawing criticism from US lawmakers and adding strain to ties with President Trump

By Gonzalo Soto

  A tanker carrying between 85,000 and 90,000 barrels of oil arrived in Havana from Mexico amid growing tensions with the US over the shipments after the fall of Venezuela’s ousted President Nicolás Maduro last week. 

According to shipping reports and vessel movements tracked by Bloomberg, the tanker Ocean Mariner was last seen en route to the Cuban capital at 2.39 p.m. UTC on Friday and was expected to arrive at its destination at 3 a.m.  

 

The vessel departed the Pajaritos Petrochemical complex, operated by state-owned Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex), in Mexico’s Veracruz state on Jan. 5. The news was reported earlier by Agence France-Presse.

 

 

Neither President Claudia Sheinbaum’s office nor Pemex responded immediately to a request for comment outside of office hours.

 

Mexico has become a key supplier of oil to the Caribbean island after the US captured Maduro, generating criticism from American lawmakers and further straining ties between Sheinbaum’s administration and President Donald Trump.

 

On Wednesday, Sheinbaum said that Mexico will continue supplying oil to Cuba, describing the shipments in part as humanitarian aid.

 

“With the current situation in Venezuela, Mexico has become an important supplier,” she told reporters at her daily press conference on Wednesday. “Previously it was Venezuela, but it’s part of what has historically been sent.”

 

Sheinbaum said some of Mexico’s oil exports to Cuba are covered by contractual obligations.