Venezuela on Thursday authorised two very large crude carriers (VLCC) to set sail for China, according to two sources familiar with Venezuela's oil export operations.
They would be only the second and third supertankers to depart the country since the US seized a ship carrying Venezuelan oil last week.
The US has said it would not allow vessels under sanction to leave Venezuelan waters. The departing tankers are not on its current sanctions list. Each is carrying around 1.9 million barrels of Venezuelan Merey heavy crude, according to internal documents from state company PDVSA.
The ships plan to navigate with their tracking transponders switched off from Venezuela's main oil port of Jose, one of the sources said.
Many vessels that provide false location data to disguise their real position while transporting Iranian, Russian or Venezuelan oil are not under US sanctions. However, they are part of the so-called "shadow fleet" of ships that are typically unregulated by Western insurers and maritime service providers.
The shadow fleet is considered exposed to possible punitive measures from the US, shipping analysts have said. In the case of Venezuela, Washington has said it is only targeting vessels under US sanctions as part of a "blockade" announced by President Donald Trump this week.
(Reporting by Aizhu Chen, Marianna Parraga and Reuters staff; editing by Nathan Crooks and David Gregorio)
