Five Iranian tankers likely carrying at least $45.5 million worth of gasoline and similar products are now sailing to
Venezuela, part of a wider deal between the two U.S.-sanctioned nations amid heightened tensions between Tehran and
Washington.
The tankers' voyage came after Venezuela's socialist leader Nicolás Maduro already turned to
Iran for help in flying in chemicals needed at an aging refinery amid a gasoline shortage, a symptom of the wider economic and political chaos gripping Latin America's one-time largest
Oil producer.
For Iran, the tankers represent a way to bring money into its cash-starved Shiite theocracy and put its own pressure on the U.S., which under President
Donald Trump has pursued maximalist campaigns against both nations.