Socialist Party News

Last July 6, Major General Manuel Quevedo joined his wife, a Catholic priest and a gathering of oil workers in prayer in a conference room at the headquarters of Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PDVSA.The career military officer, who for the past year has been boss at the troubled state-owned oil company, was at no ordinary mass. The gathering, rather, was a ceremony at which he and other senior oil ministry officials asked God to boost oil output."This place of peace and spirituality…

Spain's Navantia will build five F-110 frigates for the Spanish navy in a contract worth $4.9 billion. Navantia, which employs around 5,000 people, has in recent years racked up deep losses which reached 389 million euros in 2017.The government's representative in the Galicia region where the frigates will be built said the contract would create 1,300 direct jobs over nine years and as many as 5,700 more indirectly.Javier Losada, a member of Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez's Socialist party, said the contract would be approved on Friday during the weekly cabinet meeting.In April, Spain agreed to sell warships built at Navantia's yards to Saudi Arabia in a deal worth an estimated 1.8 billion euros.(Reuters)

The Trump administration is considering sanctioning a Venezuelan military-run oil services company and restricting insurance coverage for Venezuelan oil shipments to ratchet up pressure on socialist President Nicolas Maduro, a U.S. official said. With Maduro running for another term in an April election that Washington and its allies oppose as a sham, the United States is weighing sanctions that would target Venezuela’s vital oil sector beyond what has been done before, the official told Reuters on Wednesday. Some measures could come before the vote and others could be imposed afterwards.

Venezuelan state agencies have run up close to $1 billion in debts with shipping firms due to delays in returning containers, potentially boosting the cost of importing staple goods as the country struggles with product shortages and an economic crisis. The agencies have held containers for months or simply never returned them, at times leaving the truck-sized steel boxes for years in oil industry facilities or on provincial farms even though this costs $100 per day per container, according to industry sources. The debts have piled up over the last six years, coinciding with a steady rise in the role of state agencies in importing goods to Venezuela, particularly food. The country is served by industry giants such as Maersk of Denmark and Hamburg Sud of Germany.

A former minister in President Nicolas Maduro's government denied in an interview published on Friday accusations of corruption during the purchase of three ferries from Spain and said he was being hounded for denouncing currency crimes. Local media said an arrest warrant was issued earlier this month for Hebert Garcia, a general who served as transportation and food minister for Maduro, on charges of embezzlement in the 50 million euro ($54 million) purchase in 2013. Maduro, elected to replace the late Hugo Chavez two years ago, has vowed this week to step up a crackdown on corruption, be it from opponents or within his ruling Socialist Party. But foes accuse him of protecting the worst offenders.

The seafaring Netherlands prides itself on being a trading nation, reluctant to let politics get in the way of a good deal. But since the downing, allegedly by Moscow-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine, of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 with the loss of 193 Dutch lives, a growing Dutch chorus has called for the country to use its trade power to hit Russia in the wallet. Dozens of Russian firms have chosen to incorporate in the Netherlands to save money on tax, taking advantage of an extensive network of double taxation treaties. The country is also one of Russia's largest trade partners. Rotterdam, the world's fourth largest port, is a major distribution hub for fossil fuels and minerals and was the single largest destination for Russian exports in 2013…