Venezuela has received from Iran a $500 million credit line to fund joint investments and help improve the supply of goods “necessary for the Venezuelan people,” President Nicolas Maduro said Friday.
Declining oil prices have crimped Venezuela’s cash flow and aggravated shortages of consumer goods ranging from dish soap to milk, leaving Maduro’s government seeking financial from its few allies around the world.
“We’ve signed [an agreement for] an open credit line for $500 million that will begin to function immediately,” Maduro said during a televised address following a meeting with an Iranian delegation.
Mohammad-Reza Nemat-zadeh, Iran’s Minister of Industry, Mines and Trade, said through a translator during a broadcast on Venezuelan state television that the agreement was preliminary and would be sent to Iran’s Finance Ministry for review. That seemed to conflict with Maduro’s statement that the line went into effect “immediately.”
On returning to Tehran, Nematzadeh confirmed the credit line had been issued in talking with Iranian reporters. But. contrary to what he said in Venezuela, in Tehran he said only a framework agreement had been reached and Venezuela—not Iran—had said it needed more time to consider the text of the proposed final agreement.
No one explained if the credit line was only for goods bought in Iran or whether Venezuela could use it to buy products elsewhere.
Iran’s main projects in Venezuela have been a car assembly plant, a tractor manufacturing complex, a cement factory and the building of houses. Iran has built some 3,000 homes for the poor toward a goal of 10,000 units.
