Heavy economic sanctions against Venezuela, imposed by the administration of former US President Donald Trump, only strengthened the position of the Bolivarian leadership of the country.
So say the authors of the material published on June 3 in Foreign Policy magazine.
In August 2017, Venezuela was engulfed in a wave of protests, then to “support the protesters” then US President Donald Trump began a policy of “financial strangulation” towards Venezuela.
Using maximum pressure on Venezuela, the US authorities believed that it would lead to betrayal of the business and military elite of Venezuela and the loss of international allies such as Russia and China. However, the sanctions did not lead to a change in the “regime” of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, but to the strengthening of his position.
The authors recall that in 2017, the Trump administration blocked Venezuela and its oil state-owned PDVSA from access to the US financial system in order to remove Maduro from power. Then, in 2019, the Trump administration froze the Venezuelan government’s U.S. bank accounts and banned all U.S. companies from engaging in deals with the Venezuelan government without prior approval from the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control.