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The US Secretary of State is continuing the extraordinary threat of President Donald Trump to seize Panama.
Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State in the United States, began his first foreign official journey with a stop in Panama, an American ally who has long been vibrating from President Donald Trump’s exceptional threat to seize the Panama Channel.
Through the start of his five tour in the region, Rubio is expected to tour the strategic waterway in Panama and meet President Jose Raul Molino on Sunday.
“It is not a coincidence that my first trip keeps me abroad as foreign minister in the hemisphere,” wrote in the Wall Street Journal on Friday.
The channel is a decisive link between the Atlantic Ocean, the Pacific and the coasts, with 40 percent of the American container movement.
Trump refused to exclude the military force to seize the Panama channel, which the United States delivered at the end of 1999, saying that China had been controlled by many investments in the surrounding ports.
In his opening speech last month, Trump said that the United States “would return it” and refused to retreat on Friday. Trump said of Panama: “They have already offered many things, but we believe it is appropriate to repeat it,” Trump said of Panama.
He claimed that Panama was descending signs in the Chinese language to cover up how to “completely violate the agreement” on the channel. “Marco Rubio will speak to the man who is responsible,” Trump told reporters.
The mission of Rubio also comes in the wake of the tariffs imposed by Trump on Canada, Mexico and China, and freezing almost all US foreign aid-a more aggressive foreign policy is moving.
“The channel belongs to Panama”
Panama President Mulino has ruled out negotiation with the United States over the ownership of the channel. He said he hoped to focus Rubio’s visit instead on common interests such as migration and combating drug smuggling.
“This is impossible, I cannot negotiate,” Mulino said on Thursday. “The channel belongs to Panama.”
However, Rubio said he would explain Trump’s intention. In an interview on Thursday with the Siriusxm Megyn Kelly host, he said that Trump’s desire is driven by the legitimate national security interests caused by increasing concerns about Chinese activity and influencing Latin America.
“We will address this topic,” said Rubio. “The president was quite clear that he wanted to manage the channel again. It is clear that the Banmeans are not a big fans of this idea. This message was brought very clear.”
Although Molino rejected any negotiations, some believe that Panama may be open to the settlement under which the channels are operations on both sides of Hong Kong Port.
What is unclear is whether Trump will accept the transfer of the concession to an American or European company as it meets his demands, which seem to cover more than just operations.
“In some respects, Trump pays an open door,” said Ryan Berg, director of the Americas Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington -based research center. “But it will depend on how to define his red lines.”
He said: “There was a lot of heavy discourse and it would be about Rubio to clarify it.”
