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U.S. Foreign Minister Marco Rubio told Panamaic President José Raúl Mulino on Sunday to reduce China’s influence on the Panama Canal or to have direct consequences.
Rubio met Mulino in Panama City and said President Donald Trump found that China was a “threat to the channel” and had violated a contract for his neutrality, said the spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Tammy Bruce.
If the situation has not changed, the United States would “take measures that are necessary to protect its rights according to the contract,” wrote Bruce.
“The United States cannot and will not continue the China’s Communist Party with its effective and growing control over the Panama Canal area,” wrote Rubio on X.
Mulino, Panama’s conservative Pro-Business President, has described an earlier Trump claim that Chinese soldiers ran the channel as “nonsense” and insisted that the waterway will be “Panama”.
The United States built the 82 km long channel, which connected the Pacific and the Caribbean more than a century ago, and checked it and an adjacent area of
The contract guarantees the permanent neutrality of the channel and enables the United States to intervene when neutrality is violated.
In the attacks on the Chinese influence, the US critics of Panama focused on two ports of the channel, which are operated by Hong Kong Konglomerat CK Hutchison Holdings, under long concessions. They were renewed in 2021 for 25 years without tendering procedures.
Mulino recognized the US concerns regarding the ports on Sunday and found that his government had started an examination of the port confessions that have a market share of almost 40 percent, since speculation were announced in Panama that they may be canceled.
However, it is not clear whether the cancellation of the Chinese concessions would be sufficient to satisfy Trump, who describes the channel fees as a “complete rip off” and requires the United States to withdraw the channel.
About 200 people marched in Panama’s capital on Sunday, wore national flags and called ‘Marco Rubio from Panama’, while the US secretary’s meeting took place, reported the Associated Press. Some burned a banner with pictures from Trump and Rubio.
In another gesture in the USA, Mulino said that Panama’s participation in China’s belt and street infrastructure initiative would not be renewed without giving an appointment for its process. Panama followed Belt and Road in 2017 when it moved from Taiwan’s diplomatic recognition to China.
In recent years, Chinese state -controlled companies have built a huge congress center near the mouth of the canal and have been building a new bridge over the waterway and a cruise ship port that was secured by bidding processes. Beijing wanted to build a large new message near the canal until US intervals killed the system.
In his meeting with Mulino and Panamanian Foreign Minister Javier Martínez-Achach, Rubio also praised Panama’s efforts to end illegal migration and “underlined the desire for an improved investment climate and ensure a flat competition for fair competition through US companies”.
The number of migrants who illegally cross the Darién jungle between Panama and Colombia – in recent years – a major international migration path to the USA – has dropped since Trump took office. According to Panamas National Migration Authority, 94 percent in the same month in the previous month last month last month.
