MOSCOW, March 1. /TASS/. President of Venezuela Nicolas Maduro ordered to close the Lisbon office of the national oil and gas company PDVSA and relocate it to Moscow, Executive Vice President of the country Delcy Rodriguez said on Friday at a press conference with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

"President Nicolas Maduro instructed the Lisbon branch of PDVSA to close this office and relocate the office to Moscow," she said.

Relocation of the European office of the national oil and gas company from Lisbon to Moscow is taking place within the framework of broadening cooperation with Rosneft and Gazprom, Delcy Rodriguez pointed out. 

"This is done in line with our plans to expand technical cooperation in the oil production area with Rosneft, with Gazprom. The moment now is the most suitable to do so. We are changing the format of our relations," Rodriguez said.

On January 23, the leader of Venezuela’s opposition Juan Guaido, whose appointment as parliamentary speaker had been annulled by the Supreme Court two days before that, declared himself as acting president. On the same day, the United States recognized him as acting head of state. So did the Lima Group countries except for Mexico, the Organization of American States, and a number of other countries. On January 28, Washington imposed sanctions on Venezuela’s oil company PDVSA and put some of Venezuela’s assets in US banks under Guaido’s control.