*U.S. president-elect Donald Trump threatens to regain control of the Canal
*U.S. Congress unilaterally introduced six amendments following the signing of the Torrijos-Carter treaties
*U.S. threat to reclaim the Canal is a turning point in bilateral relations
*U.S. Congress unilaterally introduced six amendments following the signing of the Torrijos-Carter treaties
*U.S. threat to reclaim the Canal is a turning point in bilateral relations
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NewsTranscript
00:00In Panama, the canal celebrates 25 years in the hands of the country,
00:04but it continues to be overshadowed in a nation that is the fourth most unequal in the world
00:09and now faces the imperialist threat of the United States to conquer the canal again.
00:13Our colleague Rekha Chandiramani with the details.
00:19When the Panamanians recovered the canal in 2000, the waterway ceased to be a U.S. military asset
00:25and became an enterprise at the service of world trade, connecting 1,920 ports,
00:31180 maritime routes, and serving 170 countries. And although the canal generates billions of
00:37dollars a year, these benefits seem imperceptible to the majority of the population.
00:46But history did not end up making the most collective use possible of the assets
00:50that were reverted. It turns out that here, after the invasion, once the military regime
01:00was suppressed, the democracy of those at the top organized things in such a way that those
01:09reverted goods passed into the hands of the oligarchy, and $30 billion went to the great
01:14robbery of that century.
01:21The milestone comes with a bittersweet taste. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's onslaught
01:26on recovering the canal, citing alleged Chinese control and high tariffs, has brought to the
01:32fore debates on the background and remaining forms of interventionism after the reversion.
01:37The canal is problematically involved with a treaty called the Canal Neutrality Treaty,
01:45which is not legal, is not in accordance with international law, and is not convenient for
01:51Panama. On top of that, it turns out that the reverted areas are in the hands of the new
01:56North Americans, in quotation marks, the new white people, and not in the hands of the
02:02Panamanian people. But we have to disassociate ourselves from that treaty and that should be
02:11the government's position to start talking about it. We cannot accept that every time they want
02:17they threaten us because we are a small nation. After the signing of the Torrijos-Carter treaties
02:26in 1977, the U.S. Congress unilaterally introduced at least six amendments before
02:32ratifying it in 1979, the Conchini Amendment and the Church in Number Reservation being the
02:37most controversial and interventionist in tenure. We continue to be seen by the United States as
02:46their position to take care of their backyard in South America, and that is what Donald Trump
02:50is referring to, in the face of the possibility of a global conflict, to put us as a military
02:55objective of their enemies. The Mulino government has been cautious in its responses to Trump,
03:07whose statements come as a bucket of cold water in the face of the accommodating attitude that
03:11has characterized all post-invasion Panamanian governments. Trump replaced current Ambassador
03:17Mari Carmen Aponte with Kevin Marino Cabrera, a Miami-Dade County Commissioner in Florida,
03:23an active Republican member and businessman, which signals a 180-degree turn in relations
03:28between the two countries. With control of the canal, now the central focus.