A worker wearing a face mask amid the new coronavirus pandemic works to fill up a client's gas tank at a PDVSA state oil company gas station in Caracas, Venezuela, Monday, May 25, 2020. The first of five tankers loaded with gasoline sent from Iran this week is expected to temporarily ease Venezuela's fuel crunch while defying Trump administration sanctions targeting the two U.S. foes. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuelan authorities celebrated Monday as the first of five Iranian tankers loaded with gasoline docked in the South American country, delivering badly needed fuel to the crisis-stricken nation that sits atop the world’s largest oil reserves.

The gasoline shipments are arriving in defiance of stiff sanctions by the Trump administration against both nations, and they mark a new era in the burgeoning relationship between Venezuela and Iran, which is expanding its footprint in the Western Hemisphere.

“We keep moving forward and winning,” Venezuela’s Minister of Energy Tareck El Aissami tweeted.

State TV played images of the ship pulling through Caribbean waters as Venezuelan fighter jets flew overhead. El Aissami posted photographs on his Twitter account of the sun rising over the tanker docked at El Palito refinery.

Washington says both Iran and Venezuela are ruled by repressive regimes. It recently offering a $15 million reward for President Nicolás Maduro’s arrest on drug smuggling charges in a “maximum pressure” campaign against the socialist leader.

Washington recognizes opposition politician Juan Guaidó as Venezuela’s legitimate leader in a coalition of nearly 60 nations, which consider Maduro’s election a fraud because his most popular rivals were banned from running.

In a sign of rising tension inside Venezuela, the chief prosecutor on Monday asked the pro-Maduro Supreme Court to decide whether Guaidó’s political party Popular Will should be designated a terrorist organization.

“Confronted with the impossibility of obtaining power through votes, Popular Will has turned to violence,” Attorney General Tarek William Saab said, accusing the party of hiring “mercenaries” who carried out a recent failed incursion, among other alleged acts. Guaidó advisers had dealt with the man leading the attempt, though Guaidó himself denied any involvement.