Free Republic

PARIS (AP) — France’s navy, working with intelligence provided by the United Kingdom, on Thursday intercepted an oil tanker in the Mediterranean Sea that traveled from Russia, in a mission targeting the sanctioned Russian shadow fleet, officials said. French maritime authorities for the Mediterranean said the ship, the Grinch, is suspected of operating with a false flag. The French navy is escorting the ship to anchorage for more checks, the statement said. The tanker departed from the city of Murmansk in northwestern Russia, it said.

🚨🇺🇸 AMERICAN FENTANYL DEATHS COLLAPSE AFTER YEARS OF EXPLOSION After more than a decade of nonstop increases, monthly fentanyl deaths are now plunging. At the peak, over 6,000 Americans were dying every month. Now the number has dropped to around 2,700. That didn’t happen by accident. Border enforcement tightened. Drug seizures surged. Pressure on cartels increased. Trump warned this would happen years ago. The data is clear. Source: @endwokeness

…The US has accused the Marinera of breaking its sanctions by carrying oil for Venezuela, Russia and Iran. The ship, previously known as Bella 1, was boarded while south of Iceland last week and is now in the Moray Firth while a US Coast Guard ship involved in the operation is berthed in Aberdeen. US administration sources said the tanker would be subject to a judicial forfeiture process when it arrives in the US and any individuals involved in its attempts to flee face federal prosecution.… …But Moscow denounced the seizure, demanding that the US treat Russians aboard properly and...

The Rocky Mountain West remains in the grip of fentanyl and methamphetamine addiction, with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration reporting record drug seizures throughout the region in 2025, Wyoming included. Last year, the DEA seized 8,729,000 fentanyl pills and nearly 3,100 pounds of methamphetamine across the four-state mountain region that includes Colorado, Utah, Montana and Wyoming, with fentanyl seizures in Wyoming up by 264% in 2025, according to DEA figures. Statewide law enforcement continues to grapple with drugs infiltrating Wyoming communities as traces of carfentanil, an extremely potent synthetic opioid used to tranquilize large animals, was discovered in small doses...

HOUSTON, Jan 12 - Two China-flagged supertankers that were sailing to Venezuela to pick up debt-paying crude cargoes amid the U.S. oil embargo on the OPEC country have made u-turn and are now heading back to Asia, LSEG shipping data showed on Monday. Following the U.S. announcement last week of a $2 billion deal to export up to 50 million barrels of Venezuelan oil stuck in storage, U.S. president Donald Trump said China would not be deprived of Venezuela's crude. But the Asian country, the first market of the South American nation's oil, has not received any cargoes since last...

President Donald Trump announced in an interview aired Jan. 8 that the United States will begin launching strikes on the cartels in Mexico. “We knocked out 97 percent of the drugs coming in by water, and we are going to start now hitting land with regard with the cartels,” Trump told Fox News. “The cartels are running Mexico,” Trump said. “It’s very sad to watch and see what’s happened to that country.” The announcement comes just five days after Trump ordered an operation to remove Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro to the United States to face criminal charges, including narco-terrorism. This...

he oil tanker Marinera, seized by the United States, had been chartered by a private trader under the flag of Guyana.It changed its flag to Russian while in the Atlantic, already being escorted by a U.S. Coast Guard vessel, Caliber.Az reports, citing REN TV.The U.S. Coast Guard began pursuing the tanker off the coast of Venezuela after failing to obtain confirmation from Guyanese authorities that the ship was sailing under their flag.U.S. officials demanded that the captain proceed to a U.S. port, but he refused and steered the vessel into the Atlantic. En route, the tanker requested temporary registration under...

The UK's Ministry of Defence confirmed that it had provided "enabling support" to the US during its operation to seize the tanker. US forces have boarded a Venezuela-linked sanctioned oil tanker in North Atlantic after pursuing it for weeks, the US military announced on Wednesday. "The vessel was seized in the North Atlantic pursuant to a warrant issued by a US federal court after being tracked by USCGC Munro," US European Command said in a post on X. Russia sent a submarine to escort the empty oil tanker the US military had been pursuing and attempting to seize for weeks,...

Officials said most of the cash detected in luggage involved a small number of money couriers of Somali descent. The routine routes were to Dubai via Amsterdam, usually from Minneapolis but other times from Seattle, Dallas, Columbus and Atlanta. =============================================================== The Transportation Security Administration flagged nearly $700 million in cash detected in passengers’ luggage leaving the Minneapolis airport the last two years, a massive cash exodus believed to be tied to Somali immigrants and their money couriers, Homeland Security officials told Just the News. The officials said the cash movements out of Minnesota’s largest airport began about a decade ago...

The crew of the runaway Russian-flagged oil tanker Marinera released the first video showing a U.S. Coast Guard Legend class cutter in close pursuit. The video was posted online Tuesday by the Russian RT news outlet as the military buildup in England continues, potentially for a future U.S. boarding of the vessel. Until recently known as the Bella-1 before it was re-registered and the crew painted a Russian flag on it, the Marinera is part of a so-called shadow fleet. These vessels are transporting oil for Russia, Iran and Venezuela in violation of sanctions imposed by the United States and...

U.S. forces are attempting to board the Russian-flagged Marinera oil tanker in the North Atlantic Sea, sources told Fox News. The news, first reported by Reuters, comes after The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday that Russia had sent a submarine and other naval assets to escort the tanker. The vessel, previously operating under the name Bella 1, has spent more than two weeks attempting to slip past U.S. enforcement efforts targeting sanctioned oil shipments near Venezuela, the outlet reported. U.S. Southern Command, which oversees U.S. military activities in Latin America and the Caribbean, said on X that it "remains...

The U.S. on Wednesday seized a rogue Russian-flagged tanker linked to Venezuelan oil in the North Atlantic Sea. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem had earlier announced another seizure in a social media post. “In two predawn operations today, the Coast Guard conducted back-to-back meticulously coordinated boarding of two ‘ghost fleet’ tanker ships — one in the North Atlantic Sea and one in international waters near the Caribbean,” she posted. Noem said the Motor Tanker M/V Bella I (later renamed the Marinera and reflagged as Russian) and the Motor Tanker Sophia were either last docked in Venezuela or en route to...

Indian illegal alien truck drivers aren't just killing Americans with their reckless driving; they're running drugs nationwide, too. Gupreet Singh of Fresno, CA, and Jasveer Singh of Santa Clara, CA were arrested in Putnam County, Indiana on Saturday on a charge of dealing narcotics after over 300 pounds of cocaine were found in the sleeper berth of the semi tractor-trailer during a routine DOT inspection. Now those both those drugs and the truckers are off the street, and both Mr. Singhs are subject to ICE deportation holds. From the Indiana State Police: Saturday, January 3, 2026, at approximately 1:30 p.m.,...

The brilliantly executed US operation to snatch Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro benefits American citizens in many different ways.It took out the head of a major international organized crime cartel. The cartel, which the US has labeled the “Cartel de los Soles,” or Cartel of the Suns, is responsible for cocaine trafficking into the United States. Maduro had turned the upper levels of the Venezuelan government, military, and security services into a huge organized crime entity. The Department of Justice is prosecuting Maduro and others for running what a federal grand jury indictment calls “a corrupt and violent narco-terrorism conspiracy.” While...

While Maduro played dictator and CNN ran humanitarian crisis segments, American money was flowing into Caracas. The objective was acquisition. US foundations were buying Venezuelan bonds, debt, equity, gold, and oil. Pennies on the dollar while the country collapsed into starvation. Members of Congress with financial stakes through careful proxies. Through humanitarian language. Through the same laundering networks that have operated for 50 years. Two months earlier, President Trump had signed an executive order prohibiting transactions with Venezuela’s oil sector. Standard sanctions on the surface. Financial guillotine underneath. The order severed Congressional money. Cut foundation stakes. Killed portfolios belonging to...

Say what you will about the wisdom of Trump’s decision to remove Maduro, but his critics are wrong on the Constitution. The Trump critics are out again, criticizing Trump’s use of the military in Venezuela to depose Nicolás Maduro. The critics cite Congress’s power to declare war under Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the Constitution as proof that Trump acted “illegally” and “unconstitutionally.” The critics are wrong and are misreading the Constitution. Article II, Section 2 makes the president the commander in chief of the armed forces. If the president needs congressional approval before using those armed forces,...

Colombian President Gustavo Petro said Friday that survivors jumped into the sea to escape a U.S. attack on suspected drug‑smuggling boats in the Pacific Ocean. Petro warned regional governments in a post on X after posting a map showing where the strike allegedly occurred, near Mexico and Guatemala. He said three people died and others survived by abandoning the bombed vessels, citing information from Colombia’s navy. Petro posted, "Notice to all governments in the area. It seems this is the exact zone where the boaters who jumped from vessels that were bombed fell. It is known that three people died,...

Pablo Escobar was elected alternate representative to the Congress of the Republic of Colombia in 1982. Upon receiving the news of his victory, he told his wife: “Get ready to be the First Lady . . . the doors of the presidential palace will open for us.” The most notorious drug trafficker in history dreamed of becoming president of his country. To realize that dream, Escobar oversaw a reign of terror that included bombings, assassinations of judges, police, and presidential candidates, and mass kidnappings. The exact number of victims is unknown but estimated to be around 50,000. The Colombian drug...

President Donald Trump issued a clear warning to Colombian President Gustavo Petro while briefing reporters on his early Saturday morning takedown order against now former Venezuelan leader Nicholas Maduro. Trump said Petro needs to "watch his a**." His comment followed a question from a reporter who asked the president during the Maduro takedown briefing about his comments directed toward Petro in late December, when Trump warned about illegal drugs from Colombia being smuggled into the U.S. Trump replied, "Well, he has cocaine mills. He has factories where he makes cocaine, and yeah, I think I stick by my first statement....

U.S. Southern Command just announced the latest strike on a Venezuelan drug boat in the Eastern Pacific. In a significant milestone, this marks the 30th strike against a narco-terrorist drug boat. Two were killed in today’s strike. Watch the footage: VIDEO AT LINK.................. Backup here if needed: On Dec. 29, at the direction of @SecWar Pete Hegseth, Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducted a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations in international waters. Intelligence confirmed the vessel was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and was engaged in narco-trafficking operations. Two male...