Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on Tuesday directed the country’s state-owned companies to “immediately” begin to explore and exploit the oil, gas and mines in Guyana’s Essequibo region, a territory larger than Greece and rich in oil and minerals that Venezuela claims as its own.

The announcement came a day a day after Maduro got the victory he sought in a weekend referendum on whether to claim sovereignty over the region.

Maduro said he would “immediately” proceed “to grant operating licenses for the exploration and exploitation of oil, gas and mines in the entire area of our Essequibo.” He also ordered the creation of local subsidiaries of Venezuelan public companies, including oil giant PDVSA and mining conglomerate Corporación Venezolana de Guayana.

  • FlickOfTheBean@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    With who’s army fighting though? Guyana seems a bit too small to properly be able to defend itself from Venezuela… Unless Brazil goes full on South America police on the situation (and apparently, they might?), I don’t see how this will end in anything other than Venezuela steam rolling Guyana…

    • BraveSirZaphod@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      I don’t think the domestic support is really there, but America plopping a single carrier group off the coast of Venezuela would send more than strong enough a message. and we could eradicate any invading force in minutes.

      Ideally, Guyana is able to request aid from an international coalition, and the US can act in that capacity rather than be seen as unilaterally playing world police again.

          • Maalus@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Yeah, that’s the joke - that instead of going to S America they’d park another carrier off of Gaza coast