Venezuela’s foreign affairs minister denounced the seizure, calling it a “blatant theft” and “an act of international piracy.”

The U.S. seized an oil tanker off the Venezuelan coast after a monthslong buildup of military forces in the region.

Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado on Friday promised political change after slipping out of the country in secret to collect the Nobel Peace Prize, as the shock waves intensified from the Trump administration's seizure of an oil tanker earlier this week.