The president of the United States, Donald Trump, postpone telephone call with president of Panama, José Raúl Mulino, for tensions on the channel.
The president of the United States, Donald Trump, postponed a telephone call with his Panamanian counterpart, José Raúl Mulino, due to last -minute modifications on the American president's agenda, according to a release Posted on Friday by the Panamanian government.
Both nations maintain a controversydue to US government statements to want to direct the Panama Canal, a situation that the Panamanian government has rejected.
Mulino himself described Thursday as a “falsehood (…) intolerable” an information released Wednesday by the Trump administration, which indicated that his country would have accepted not to charge for the transit of US ships in the interoceanic channel.
On the other hand, he has rejected the claims that China controls the channel, which is administered by the authority of the Panama Canal, an autonomous agency supervised by the Panamanian government.
The US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, met with the Panamanian President in Panama City, on Sunday. After his visit, days later, he said that his country has the obligation, according to a treaty, to protect the channel If this is attacked.
“It seems absurd to me that we have to pay rates to travel through an area that we are obliged to protect in conflict times. Those are our expectations … They were clearly understood in those conversations,” Rubio said during a press conference in Santo Domingo.
The Panama Foreign Ministry also reported, in the statement, that it will share the new call date among the leaders, which was agreed for 3:30 pm on Friday.