The Panamanian government expressed this Tuesday to the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, its concern about the statement by the President of the United States, Donald Trump, that he will seek to regain control of the Panama Canal.
In a letter, distributed to the press byr the Panamanian Foreign Ministry, Panama’s permanent mission to the UN tells Guterres that Trump’s statements on Monday in his inauguration speech “are worrying.”
“We request your good offices to transmit this communication to the 15 members of the United Nations Security Council,” of which Panama has been a part since January 1, stressed the letter, which summarizes Trump’s statements and the Panamanian government’s response.
Trump reiterated in his speech on Monday what he had already said in recent weeks, that his government is going to “recover” the Panama Canal, under Panamanian sovereignty for 25 years, due to the alleged presence of China in the interoceanic waterway.
“China operates the Panama Canal, and we didn’t give it to China, we gave it to Panama. And we are going to get it back,” Trump said.
“The canal is and will continue to be Panama’s”
The Panamanian president, José Raúl Mulino, responded that “the canal is and will continue to belong to Panama.”
The Panama Canal, built by the United States and inaugurated in 1914, has this North American country and China as its two largest users.
The United States handed it over to Panama in December 1999 in compliance with the treaties signed in 1977 by then-President Jimmy Carter and Panamanian General Omar Torrijos.
Keep reading:
. Trump expresses disdain for Latin American countries: “We don’t need them”
. How much control of the Panama Canal does China really have?
. Donald Trump promises to recover the Panama Canal and rename the Gulf of Mexico