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REUTERS

Venezuela's cash-strapped state oil company PDVSA has made roughly $2.6 billion in bond payments, the company confirmed on Wednesday.

 

President Nicolas Maduro's government has met commitments to Wall Street investors for years by slashing imports of basic goods such as food and medicine, spurring the country's chronic product shortages.

 

"The payment is already in the account," an investors told Reuters.

 

PDVSA confirmed on Twitter that it had made the payment.

 

Vice President Tareck El Aissami said the payment also interest payments on Venezuela's sovereign debt.

 

"Despite the ruthless economic war, in conspiracy with local media and foreign news agencies, spurred by imperialists and their internal cronies ... the revolutionary government has paid $2.557 billion," El Aissami said in a statement on Twitter.

 

Venezuela's bonds are the highest-yielding of any emerging market security due to concerns about default.

 

Maduro has dismissed default talk as a smear campaign against his administration, and he blames the country's problems on an "economic war" led by business leaders with the support of the US.