Venezuela will not hand over control of its cash-strapped state oil firm PDVSA to Russian oil giant Rosneft, a close aide to Nicolas Maduro told Russian news agency RIA Novosti , dismissing such reports as false. “No, of course not,” Maduro’s close advisor Diosdado Cabello said, when asked could PDVSA be handed over to Rosneft. Venezuela has good relations with Rosneft and excellent relations with Russia, Cabello said. Vladimir Putin and Rosneft’s CEO Igor Sechin are Venezuela’s best friends, Cabello said, but dismissed reports that the country sitting on top of the world’s largest oil reserves is preparing to cede control over its state oil firm to the largest Russian oil company. The Venezuelan government is readying to hand over control over state oil company PDVSA to Rosneft, a Venezuelan newspaper reported earlier this week, citing sources from the industry. The radical move was supposedly being discussed as a […]