The United States captured an oil tanker in the Indian Ocean that had managed to avoid Donald Trump's blockade of ships in the Caribbean.

First modification: 02/09/2026 - 18:37

"US forces captured" the ship, the Pentagon said after announcing in X that they had boarded the government-sanctioned Aquila II "without incident."

The tanker "was operating in defiance of the quarantine established by President Trump for sanctioned vessels in the Caribbean. He fled and we followed him," the Pentagon stated in X, adding that the ship was "tracked and pursued" from the Caribbean to the Indian Ocean.

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The publication included a video in which US forces were seen descending with ropes from a helicopter to the deck of an oil tanker.

This is the eighth ship seized by the United States since Trump ordered in December the "blockade" of sanctioned oil tankers leaving or heading to Venezuela.

It is also the second oil tanker captured far from the Caribbean after managing to evade US forces. Last month, U.S. forces seized a Russian-linked oil tanker that left Venezuela in the North Atlantic.

Washington has deployed a huge naval force in the Caribbean with the aim of attacking drug trafficking to the United States.

These forces have since collaborated with the arrest of Nicolás Maduro in an attack on January 3 in Venezuela, and in operations to intercept sanctioned oil tankers.

The captured ships represent a tiny part of what is known as the ghost fleet, an undetermined number of oil tankers used by several countries to evade the sanctions imposed against this sector by Washington.

"It's a very small percentage," US Rear Admiral David Barata told a congressional hearing earlier this month.

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