Free Republic

MIAMI (AP) — Six American oil executives under house arrest in Venezuela were rounded up by police hours after President Donald Trump met Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s chief opponent at the White House, according to family members of the men. Alirio Zambrano said early Thursday that the executives of Houston-based Citgo were abruptly taken from their homes last night by the SEBIN intelligence police. Zambrano, the brother of two of the six detained men, said their current whereabouts are unknown. “We demand to know they are safe but more importantly their freedom!” Zambrano said on social media, adding that he...

Pope Francis told leading oil executives Saturday that the transition to less-polluting energy sources “is a challenge of epochal proportions” and warned that satisfying the world’s energy needs “must not destroy civilization.” The Vatican said Francis held a two-day conference with the executives as a follow-up to his encyclical three years ago that called on people to save the planet from climate change and other environmental ills. Participants included the CEOs of Italian oil giant ENI, British Petroleum, ExxonMobil and Norway’s Statoil as well as scientists and managers of major investment funds. Their remarks on the first day of the...

Pope Francis will meet with some of the world’s oil executives next week, likely to give them another moral nudge to clean up their act on global warming. Climate change policy and science experts are cautiously hopeful but aren’t expecting any miracles or even noticeable changes. The conference will be a follow-up to the pope’s encyclical three years ago calling on people to save the planet from climate change and other environmental ills, Vatican spokesman Greg Burke confirmed Friday. Cardinal Peter Turkson, who spearheaded the encyclical, set up the June 8-9 conference with the executives. The pope himself will speak...