A row over a tanker spill more than 20 years ago may be raised at the United Nations by Venezuela.

The country’s energy and petroleum commission is threatening to escalate a dispute over compensation for a spill from the 57,000-dwt tanker Plate Princess (built 1979) to the highest diplomatic levels.

There is a long-running stand-off between Venezuela’s Supreme Court and the International Oil Pollution Compensation (IOPC) Funds over about $80m of dubious claims from fishermen, arising from a small Lake Maracaibo spill by the Plate Princess in 1997.