The probe has led to 10 officials and 11 businessmen
being arrested and 11 more wanted.
PDVSA President Pedro Tellechea was appointed as the new oil
minister last week, giving him wide control of the industry.
Maduro said last week a new restructuring process must begin in
PDVSA, formally known as Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A., to audit
its accounts and uncover corruption.
The new minister must safeguard "the interests of the
Republic," the gazette showed.
PDVSA's restructuring commission was created to adopt urgent
measures to "protect the industry from imperialist aggression."
Its functions were expanded last year.
The probe, revealed last week, is linked to PDVSA's heavy
losses in recent years, when tankers left the country with
cargoes that had not been paid for in full, officials have said.
PDVSA has accumulated $21.2 billion in accounts receivables
since 2020, documents viewed by Reuters showed. The internal
disclosure of the enormous amount of unpaid sales - about 84% of
PDVSA's total value of invoiced shipments - revealed for the
first time the depths of revenue losses due to the withdrawal of
established buyers.
(Reporting by Deisy Buitrago and Mayela Armas; Writing by
Carolina Pulice; Editing by Richard Chang)
By Deisy Buitrago
CARACAS, March 27 (Reuters) - Venezuela's President
Nicolas Maduro suspended a committee he had appointed to
restructure state oil firm PDVSA under the supervision of Tareck
El Aissami, the oil minister who resigned last week amid an
expanding anti-corruption probe into the company and the
judiciary.
Maduro last week ended the 2020 decree that had created the
committee, following El Aissami's resignation and extension of
the investigation which began in October, according to the
country's official gazette, dated March 22.
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