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Venezuela Delivers Heating Oil to Poor New Yorkers Despite Tensionswith US

Posted on: Wednesday, 7 December 2005, 09:00 CST

Venezuela delivers heating oil to poor New Yorkers despite tensions with US

NEW YORK, Dec. 6 (Xinhua) -- Despite years of tensions with the United States, Venezuela is delivering cheap heating oil to low- income citizens in New York under its program to help the poor in the world's richest nation.

Venezuelan government officials on Tuesday accompanied a heating oil truck to the Bronx neighborhood in their first delivery of the oil to the needy.

"For us, this is the human face of the energy supply between the US and Venezuela," said Venezuelan Ambassador Bernardo Alvarez at a ceremony which was also attended by US congressman Jose E Serrano and Felix Rodriguez, chief executive officer of Citgo, the Houston- based refining subsidiary of Venezuela's state-owned oil company PDVSA.

During the next four months, Citgo is to sell 30 million liters of heating oil to three non-profit housing developments in New York for 40 percent less than its usual price.

The housing associations have also agreed to pass on the savings to their tenants in rent reductions or other benefits.

Venezuela is the fifth largest oil exporter of the world and a key crude supplier to the United States, providing the latter with 1.5 million barrels of crude per day.

But the two countries have been locked in a war of words and friction for the past six years with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez repeatedly accusing the US government of planning to assassinate him and initiate military intervention. Washington has denied all the charges.

Source: Xinhua News Agency - CEIS

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