Panama rejects China's Belt & Road plan after Marco Rubio's visit

Sunday marked Secretary of State Marco Rubio's first visit to Panama since being sworn in as Secretary of State. It was a successful visit because "Panama's president vowed Sunday to end a key development deal with China after meeting with Secretary of State Marco Rubio and after complaints from President Donald Trump that the Latin American country had ceded control over its critical shipping canal to Beijing." Make no mistake about this. This is a defeat for the Chinese Communist Party, aka CCP.

China wanted to influence Panama through its Belt And Road Initiative. Fox is reporting that "José Raúl Mulino, Panama's president, said his nation's sovereignty over the 51-mile waterway, which connects the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, will remain unchanged. But he said he would not renew a 2017 memorandum of understanding to join China’s Belt and Road global development initiative and that Panama would instead look to work more closely with the U.S."

Ric Grenell puts things into perspective during this interview:

This article highlights what happened:
"The 2017 memorandum of understanding on the Silk Road, part of the Belt and Road initiative, will not be renewed by my government," Mulino said. "That is a fact. We are going to study the possibility of whether it can be ended earlier or not. I think it is up for renewal in one or two years, because it’s every three. So that initiative which was signed will not be renewed by my government."
Saying that this won't sit well with China is understatement. China isn't just looking to overtake the U.S. It wants to show the world that they're the superior nation. Defeats like this damage China's image as the world leader.

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