Venezuela will contract with an Iranian shipyard to build two oil tankers under an existing construction agreement bedeviled by payment delays and difficulties with needed certifications, Reuters cited people familiar with the matter as saying. This is seen as a challenge to the US sanctions. It comes weeks after the visit of Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian to Caracas where he held a meeting with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. Mehr News Agency reported that the two parties "emphasized the strengthening and monitoring of projects and accelerating their implementation, as well as vigilance in defending their national interests against external pressures," a statement from the Iranian Foreign Ministry said. Moreover, Maduro signed a 20-year agreement to expand ties in the defense, oil, and petrochemical industries during his visit to Tehran in June. Venezuela’s state-run energy firm PDVSA since last year has redoubled efforts to buy and lease oil tankers to rebuild its own fleet. Its maritime operations have suffered from a long-standing lack of capital and US sanctions that have made it difficult to obtain insurance and receive classifications essential to navigate in international waters. The two new Aframax tankers, to be named India Urquia and India Mara, will cost 31.66 million euros ($33.77 million) each, an internal PDVSA document detailing the proposed agreement showed. The vessels will be built by Iran Marine Industrial Company (SADRA) at its Bushehr shipyard, which built two previous vessels for PDVSA, the Aframaxes Arita and Anita, that can each carry 500,000-800,000 barrels of oil. “(Construction of) the India Urquia must start soon,” one of the sources said. State firms from Iran and Venezuela will start in the coming weeks a 100-day revamp of the South American nation's largest refining complex to restore its crude distillation capacity, four sources close to the plan told Reuters last month. Indian Oil Minister Hardeep Singh Puri also said India will consider buying oil from Iran and Venezuela if sanctions are lifted.