Panama vows to end key canal deal with China post meeting with Rubio -

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Feb 3, Monday 2025: Panama’s President José Raúl Mulino pledged on Sunday to end a key development deal with China after meeting with the U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

Mulino announced that Panama would not renew its agreement with China’s Belt and Road Initiative, which was signed in 2017. This comes after complaints from President Donald Trump that the Latin American country had ceded control over the Panama Canal to Beijing.

The Panamian President Mulino said his nation’s sovereignty over the 51-mile waterway, which connects the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, will remain unchanged. But said he would not renew a 2017 memorandum of understanding to join China’s Belt and Road global development initiative and that Panam would instead look to work more closely with the U.S

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The country will instead look forward to working more closely with the U.S. on issues such as migration and combating drug trafficking.

During his visit, Rubio wrote in a post on X that “the United States cannot, and will not, allow the Chinese Communist Party to continue with its effective and growing control over the Panama Canal area. I met with the Panamanian President. We also discussed efforts to end the hemisphere’s mass migration crisis and ensure fair competition for U.S. firms.”