Panama president rules out talks with Trump over canal threat

Panamanian President Jose Raul Mulino on Thursday ruled out negotiations with Donald Trump over control of the Panama Canal, which the U.S. president-elect threatened to demand be returned to Washington.

Mulino also rejected the possibility of reducing canal tolls for U.S. vessels, and denied that China had any influence over the vital waterway connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.

"If there is an intention to talk, then there's nothing to talk about," Mulino told a weekly press conference.

"The canal is Panamanian and belongs to Panamanians. There's no possibility of opening any kind of conversation around this reality, which has cost the country blood, sweat and tears," he added.

Monrovia NSU CHALLENGER bulk carrier transits the expanded canal through Cocoli Locks at the Panama Canal, on the outskirts of Panama City, Panama April 19, 2023. Reuters

The canal, inaugurated in 1914, was built by the United States but handed to Panama on December 31, 1999, under treaties signed some two decades earlier by then-U.S. president Jimmy Carter and Panamanian nationalist leader Omar Torrijos.

Trump on Saturday slammed what he called unfair fees for U.S. ships passing through the canal and hinted at China's growing influence.

If Panama could not ensure "the secure, efficient and reliable operation" of the channel, "then we will demand that the Panama Canal be returned to us, in full, and without question," he said.

Mulino said the usage fees were "not set at the whim of the president or the administrator" of the interoceanic waterway, but under a long-established "public and open process."

"There is absolutely no Chinese interference or participation in anything to do with the Panama Canal," Mulino said.

On Tuesday, dozens of demonstrators gathered outside the U.S. embassy in Panama City chanting "Trump, animal, leave the canal alone" and burning an image of the incoming American president.