U.S. companies eyeing Venezuela’s vast mineral wealth may find themselves entering one of the world’s most opaque and dangerous supply chains — a gold economy dominated by armed groups, criminal syndicates and corrupt military-run networks that experts say could expose foreign firms to money laundering, human-rights abuses and environmental destruction.
The risks come as Washington quietly opens the door to mining investment following the capture of former strongman Nicolás Maduro, creating a rare moment of cooperation with Caracas even as much of the country’s mineral-rich south remains under the control of violent groups, from guerrillas to armed gangs.
The opening follows a series of U.S. licenses allowing negotiations, transactions and preliminary investment agreements involving Venezuelan gold and other minerals, part of a broader effort to stabilize the country’s economy under interim President Delcy Rodríguez. While intended to attract foreign capital and formalize production, analysts say the measures could draw American firms into a sector where extraction remains largely informal, oversight is limited and armed groups and military-linked networks control significant portions of the supply chain.
The shift comes amid an unusual thaw between Washington and Caracas following the pre-dawn U.S. operation earlier this year that led to the capture of Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, who now face drug trafficking charges in federal court in New York.
In the aftermath of the raid, Venezuela’s socialist leadership reorganized around Rodríguez, who has pursued pragmatic cooperation with U.S. officials as part of a broader stabilization effort that includes energy, security and economic engagement.
Since Maduro’s apprehension, U.S. officials have maintained regular contacts with Rodríguez’s government, which has sought sanctions relief and foreign investment while pledging to restore order in key sectors, including oil and mining. The emerging cooperation has opened the door for American companies to explore opportunities in Venezuela’s mineral-rich south, even as governance on the ground remains dominated by armed groups and informal networks. The alignment reflects a transactional relationship in which Washington gains access to strategic resources while Caracas seeks revenue and international legitimacy during a fragile transition.
Any takers?
Despite the policy shift, U.S. corporate interest has remained limited.
So far, no U.S. company has publicly announced plans to enter Venezuela’s mining sector, underscoring the uncertainty surrounding the opening. The only disclosed deal involves Singaporean commodities trader Trafigura, which has offices in Houston and which signed an agreement with Venezuela’s state-owned miner Minerven to purchase between 650 and 1,000 kilograms of gold doré — a semi-refined, impure alloy — for shipment to U.S. refineries under a separate arrangement with Washington, as first reported by Axios.
A White House official confirmed the agreement, telling Reuters that Interior Secretary Doug Burgum helped secure what the administration described as a “historic” transaction aimed at helping restore Venezuela’s mining sector while supplying minerals to American industry. The official did not provide details on pricing or other terms of the deal.
The agreement has already drawn scrutiny in Washington. In a letter sent April 7 to Trafigura’s chief executive, U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, warned that corruption, environmental damage and forced labor are widespread in Venezuela’s mining sector, much of which is linked to criminal organizations and groups designated by the United States as foreign terrorist organizations.
The senator requested details about the company’s human-rights due diligence, anti-money laundering safeguards and efforts to ensure the gold was not sourced from illicit operations before entering U.S. markets.
Wyden also noted that Minerven had previously been sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department for operating in a sector used to finance armed groups and sustain the Maduro government, and said key details of the new agreement — including supply chain verification, counterparties and environmental safeguards — remain unclear. The letter asks Trafigura to identify the origin of the gold, compliance mechanisms and any U.S. entities involved in refining or distributing the material, highlighting concerns that Venezuelan gold linked to human rights abuses could enter American supply chains.
It is unclear whether Trafigura has responded to the senator’s letter.
Not like oil
Cristina Burelli, founder of the environmental watchdog SOS Orinoco, said the policy shift risks creating a dangerous mismatch between legal authorization and realities on the ground, where mining operations are largely controlled by armed actors.
“The United States is trying to apply the same logic used for oil to minerals,” she said, warning that the mining economy is far more fragmented and difficult to monitor. Venezuela’s mineral extraction is spread in different mines all through the southern region, which amount to roughly 200,000 square miles — about four times the size of the state of Florida — with an estimated 90% of production smuggled through informal channels, making meaningful due diligence extremely difficult.
Unlike oil, which flows through pipelines and centralized infrastructure, gold production in southern Venezuela is dispersed across hundreds of small sites accessible only by river, dirt tracks or airstrips. The fragmented geography allows armed groups to dominate territory, tax miners and control supply chains long before the gold reaches official channels.
In Venezuela’s southern mining regions, particularly Bolívar and Amazonas states, extraction is dominated by small-scale miners operating under the control of armed groups, criminal gangs and military units. Access to fuel, machinery and transportation routes often requires payments in gold to authorities or armed networks, embedding illicit production in the supply chain.
That structure means foreign investors entering the sector — even indirectly — could end up purchasing gold that has passed through illegal hands. Guerrilla groups such as Colombia’s National Liberation Army (ELN), dissident FARC factions and Venezuelan criminal organizations operate across mining zones, frequently imposing taxes on miners and controlling pits through violence.
Burelli also warned the policy shift could transform Venezuela into a laundering hub for illicit gold from across the Amazon basin, with miners from Brazil, Colombia, Guyana and Suriname channeling production through Venezuelan networks before reaching global buyers.
“This will become the easiest route to clean illegal gold,” she said.
Financing violent networks
Those concerns are echoed by Bram Ebus, a consultant for the International Crisis Group and co-director of Amazon Underworld, a media alliance that covers and investigates impacts on the Amazon region, who says foreign engagement in Venezuela’s mining sector risks financing armed groups and human-rights abuses.
“What we think is that the U.S. is going for Venezuela’s minerals without any precaution when it comes to contributing to financing human-rights violations, non-state armed groups, including groups on the U.S. terrorist list like the National Liberation Army, the ELN,” Ebus said. “Environmental protections are really low, and we don’t see that the U.S. is requiring this bar to be heightened when it comes to safeguards.”
He also warned that illicit minerals could enter international markets through Venezuelan state companies, effectively laundering gold from neighboring countries before it reaches U.S. refiners.
“If the gold goes through a Venezuelan state company, it can be sold as Venezuelan gold to the United States. Previously ‘toxic’ gold might become part of the U.S. refining market,” Ebus said.
Ebus added that interest in Venezuela is already dividing potential investors, with smaller risk-taking firms eager to enter while major companies remain cautious.
“What we see are ‘cowboy companies’ very much wanting to get involved, while more reputable mining companies are very wary,” he said.
In many mining districts, criminal organizations effectively govern territory, controlling entry, resolving disputes and enforcing authority through violence.
“They can decide who enters and leaves a mining area. They carry out rudimentary forms of justice, including summary killings,” Ebus said.
He described Venezuelan gold as inherently tied to violence.
“Gold in Venezuela is never ‘bloodless,” he said. ”Non-state armed groups commit the most brutal human rights violations — sexual violence, disappearances, torture, killings and child involvement.”
Security risks, criminal control
Security expert José García, a specialist in Venezuelan military intelligence, said the situation on the ground remains highly volatile and dominated by criminal groups, raising additional risks for foreign companies considering entry into the sector.
García said mining areas in Bolívar state remain under the control of organizations such as gangs such as Tren de Aragua and Tren de Guayana and ELN guerrillas, which operate across different mines and control workers, transport routes and processing centers. The territory, he warned, functions as a patchwork of criminal enclaves rather than a unified mining zone.
He said dismantling those structures would require sustained “mine-by-mine” operations, not limited security interventions, because each site is run by its own armed hierarchy.
According to García, U.S. companies could initially enter the market by purchasing unprocessed ore for cyanidation and refining — a step that could place them directly into supply chains dominated by criminal groups. Cyanidation is a process used to extract gold from low-grade ore by dissolving it in a dilute cyanide solution.
García said he has identified at least 79 companies operating across the mining process, including material supply, extraction, cyanidation and gold processing.
That layered structure, he said, creates multiple points where illicit gold can be blended into legal streams before export.
García also warned that the United States may be underestimating the territorial complexity of the mining zones. While negotiations and legal frameworks are being developed in Caracas, the actual mines remain controlled by armed groups with their own governance systems.
He described the opening of the sector as a “high risk, high reward” scenario in which early entrants may accept exposure to criminal networks in exchange for access to valuable deposits. Some companies, he said, are already exploring positioning themselves before stronger regulatory frameworks are in place.
Working conditions in the mines further illustrate the risks. García said miners operate in extremely precarious environments marked by tunnel collapses, landslides and improvised extraction techniques. Workers often enter deep shafts using rudimentary equipment, while enforcement of rules is carried out through violence.
He also described a broader social ecosystem shaped by human trafficking, prostitution, tuberculosis and debt systems that trap workers in near-slavery conditions. Violence is used to enforce discipline, and those accused of theft or rule violations may be executed or disappeared.
The result, García said, is an environment where supply chains are inseparable from criminal governance, making it difficult for foreign buyers to ensure minerals are not linked to abuses.
A decade of violence
Oscar Murillo, general coordinator of Venezuelan human-rights organization PROVEA, said the risks facing foreign companies must also be understood in the context of the Orinoco Mining Arc, a vast territory created by the Venezuelan regime through a decree in 2016 that spans almost 45,000 square miles — about the size of the state of Pennsylvania.
Murillo said the initiative was originally presented as a large-scale industrial mining project designed to attract multinational investment, but it never materialized. Instead, the decree became a framework that allowed illegal mining to expand across southern Venezuela.
Without legal guarantees and amid Venezuela’s institutional crisis, major companies stayed away. Into that vacuum stepped irregular armed groups, criminal organizations and military units that began controlling extraction sites and local populations.
Murillo said the Mining Arc later became a financial lifeline for the Venezuelan regime as oil revenues collapsed, with gold extraction expanding rapidly under opaque arrangements involving state players and armed groups. The growth came alongside environmental destruction, displacement of indigenous communities and widespread violence.
He described mining zones marked by murders, disappearances and forced labor, with miners often required to surrender large portions of their production to armed groups controlling the sites. Institutional oversight largely collapsed, turning parts of southern Venezuela into areas where the rule of law effectively disappeared.
Together, Murillo said, these dynamics created a mining economy dominated by armed group — a structure that remains largely intact as foreign investment begins to explore entry into the sector.
The expansion came at the expense of local communities and the environment. Forests were cleared, rivers contaminated and Indigenous territories encroached upon, he said.
“The Mining Arc acted as a financial lifeline,” Murillo said, adding that the revenue was accompanied by systematic human rights violations, displacement of Indigenous communities and the collapse of public services.
Murillo also highlighted the broader environmental consequences, noting that the affected region lies within the Venezuelan Amazon and includes key watersheds that feed into the Amazon basin.
Systematic human rights violations
Murillo said mining zones are characterized by murders, massacres, disappearances and forced labor, with miners often required to hand over large portions of their production to armed groups.
He said workers frequently operate in shafts 60 to 70 meters deep under unsafe conditions, while landslides and tunnel collapses regularly cause deaths. Armed groups impose rules, enforce discipline and punish violations with violence.
“There is no official inspection ensuring safe environmental and hygiene conditions,” Murillo said, adding that miners are often forced to surrender up to 70% of their gold to criminal groups controlling the sites.
The collapse of institutional oversight has compounded the risks. Murillo said Venezuela once had established mining institutions, including state company Minervén, but those structures have largely broken down.
“There are no investigations into crimes or disappearances,” he said, describing mining areas as territories where the rule of law has effectively disappeared.
Strategic opportunity, legal risk
Environmental groups say the risks extend beyond criminal financing to broader ecological destruction if foreign investment accelerates extraction.
Fundación AguaClara, a Venezuelan environmental nonprofit with more than two decades of work in the country’s southern ecosystems, has warned that opening the sector could trigger a deeper expansion of mining across fragile regions of the Venezuelan Amazon.
“This is not just about changing partners. Opening the door to the United States signals a much broader mining advance, including into critical minerals such as thorium,” the organization said, noting that the radioactive element has been identified in southern Venezuela.
The group also warned that labeling minerals as “strategic” could increase militarization and leave existing extraction dynamics intact. “The pranes, the criminal syndicates, the guerrilla groups — protected by corrupt national military officials — all of them will continue to operate. Unless the extractive model changes, it will remain gold of violent origin,” the foundation said.
AguaClara also emphasized the human and environmental toll, particularly for Indigenous communities. “The people living in these communities are not being taken into account. Their habitats are being destroyed, pushing them toward conditions close to extermination,” the group said.
Together, experts paint a picture of a sector where formal investment risks intersecting with criminal governance, armed violence and illicit supply chains.
For U.S. companies, the opportunity to access gold and critical minerals comes with the possibility of inadvertently financing armed groups, laundering illicit production or becoming entangled in networks that dominate Venezuela’s mining frontier.
“The danger is that companies think they are entering a regulated market,” Burelli said. “In reality, they may be stepping into a criminal economy.”
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