China’s presence around Canal a security concern, says US envoy ahead of Rubio's Panama visit

Ahead of Rubio’s visit to the country, US Special Envoy for Latin America Mauricio Claver-Carone said on Friday that China’s presence around the Panama Canal is a national security concern that Panama’s government has to deal with.

Rubio will arrive in Panama on Saturday on his first official foreign trip as America’s top diplomat, signaling the importance that both he and Trump place on securing the canal. Although immigration will be a major topic of conversation in Panama and at his other stops, Rubio said the canal issue is a priority.

Rubio will also visit El Salvador, Costa Rica, Guatemala and the Dominican Republic, where the Trump administration’s efforts to repatriate migrants from the region and stem migration will be on the agenda, Claver-Carone said in a briefing call with reporters.

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Claver-Carone said it was not Mulino’s fault but that under previous Panamanian governments, China’s presence around the Canal ”got completely out of hand” and Mulino ”has to deal with it.”

”This increasingly creeping presence of Chinese companies and actors throughout the Canal Zone, in everything from ports and logistics to telecommunications infrastructure and otherwise, which is very concerning, not only frankly to the national security of the United States, but frankly to the national security of Panama and to the entire Western Hemisphere,” he said. ”So that will be an issue of discussion.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio says President Donald Trump’s desire to acquire Greenland and retake control of the Panama Canal is driven by legitimate national security interests stemming from growing concerns about Chinese activity and influence in the Arctic and in Latin America.

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Ahead of a trip to Central America that will start in Panama this weekend, Rubio said Thursday that he could not predict if Trump would succeed in buying Greenland from Denmark or restoring American authority over the Panama Canal while he is office. But he said the attention that Trump will give to both would have an impact.

“What I think you can rest assured of is that four years from now, our interest in the Arctic will be more secure; our interest in the Panama Canal will be more secure,” Rubio said in an interview with SiriusXM host Megyn Kelly.

Chinese investments in ports and other infrastructure and facilities at both the Pacific and Caribbean ends of the canal are a cause for major concern, leaving Panama and the critical shipping route vulnerable to China, he said.

“They’re all over Panama,” Rubio said of Chinese companies that many experts believe are beholden to the government in Beijing and would carry out orders to cut off or limit traffic to the canal in the event of a conflict with Taiwan or an unrelated breakdown in relations with the U.S.

“If the government in China in a conflict tells them to shut down the Panama Canal, they will have to,” he said. “I have zero doubt that they have contingency planning to do so that is a direct threat.”

Rubio added that “if China wanted to obstruct traffic in the Panama Canal, they could” and that would be a violation of the 1977 treaty signed by former President Jimmy Carter under which the U.S. ceded control of the American-built canal to Panama in 1999.

He also echoed Trump’s complaint that American ships are being overcharged for using the canal, which would also be a violation of the treaty.

“We should not be in a position of having to pay more than other countries. In fact, we should be getting a discount or maybe for free, because we paid for the thing,” he said.

With inputs from agencies