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    Panama opposition party accuses US of ‘camouflaged invasion’

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    Panamanian opposition politicians have accused the US of launching a “camouflaged invasion” of the country, amid simmering discontent over the government’s handling of the diplomatic crisis.After a three-day visit by the US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump appeared to confirm that US military personnel had been deployed to the Central American country on Thursday, telling reporters: “We’ve moved a lot of troops to Panama.”Hegseth said that the US would increase its military presence at three former US bases in the country to “secure the Panama canal from Chinese influence”.The last US military bases in Panama were vacated in 1999 as a condition of the 1977 Torrijos-Carter treaties to hand the canal to Panamanian ownership. Under the canal’s neutrality treaty, no foreign power can “maintain military forces, defense sites and military installations within its national territory”, and the US comments have prompted outrage in Panama.“This is a camouflaged invasion,” said Ricardo Lombana, the leader of the opposition Other Way Movement. “An invasion without firing a shot, but with a cudgel and threats.”At a Wednesday press conference to announce the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the US, Panama’s minister of public security, Frank Abrego, said the agreement would not impinge on his nation’s sovereignty and that the country would not accept military bases.However, a full text of the MOU included aerial photos of Fort Sherman, Rodman naval base and Howard air force base, with areas outlined for “training”, “humanitarian activities” and the “installation of US property”.The Panamanian government says they are not “military bases” and that the deal is temporary, but opposition parties have rejected such claims.“If you have an installation which is for use of foreign soldiers and they have control over what happens inside – and Panama has to ask in advance to enter – that’s a military base,” said Lombana.For many Panamanians, the return of US armed forces – even for supposed “joint operations” – will bring back uncomfortable memories of 1989’s Operation Just Cause, when American troops killed thousands of civilians.A second agreement allows US navy ships to be reimbursed for the fees they pay to the canal. That preferential treatment would appear to violate the neutrality treatment and could open the door to further attempts to negotiate down the fees charged by the canal.On Thursday a local lawyer filed a legal case against the Panamanian president, José Raúl Mulino, accusing him of “crimes against the international personality of the state”.Frustration is growing over the government’s handling of the diplomatic crisis. Since Trump declared his plan to “take back” the Panama canal on his 20 January inauguration speech, all communication on the topic has been through Mulino and the details of negotiations kept largely secret.This has led to serious differences in the US and Panamanian accounts of those negotiations. When the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, visited in early February, Mulino told press that the meeting had been “very cordial” and that the canal was not under threat. Later, however, Rubio said the situation around the canal was “unacceptable” and Trump continued to call for the return of the canal.The latest example came on Tuesday when two different statements concerning Hegseth’s meeting with Mulino were published. In the Panamanian version, Hegseth was said to have recognized Panama’s “inalienable sovereignty” over the canal, but those words were absent from the secretary of defense’s statement and Hegseth refused to acknowledge Panamanian ownership of the canal at Wednesday’s press conference. Panama says that the US omitted the phrase from the agreed joint statement.Mulino has also opted to avoid engaging with other countries – such as Canada and Mexico – to gain international support for his country’s cause.On Thursday the local chapter of Transparency International requested on X that Mulino “inform the country of all the details of what is happening, the agreements in process and the pressures he is receiving if that is the case. The country requires transparency in order to achieve unity against this threat to our sovereignty.”Even before Hegseth’s visit, Mulino had faced heavy local criticism for offering concessions to the US without gaining firm assurances over the future of the canal.Two-thirds of Panamanians disapprove of the way he is running the country. In addition to the diplomatic crisis he has passed an unpopular social security reform and angered environmentalists by opening talks with a copper mine closed down in 2023 due to popular protest. He lacks the backing of many of his party’s deputies in congress who are loyal to his political patron, Ricardo Martinelli, who has been residing in the Nicaraguan embassy to escape corruption charges and recently saw his attempt to gain exile in that country rejected.Popular demonstrations against US policy and the handling of the government are expected on Saturday. More

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      Pentagon chief says US could ‘revive’ Panama bases

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      The US defence secretary has floated the idea of the country’s troops returning to Panama to “secure” its strategically vital canal, a suggestion quickly shot down by the Central American country’s government.Pete Hegseth suggested during a visit to Panama that “by invitation” the US could “revive” military bases or naval air stations and rotate deployments of its troops to an isthmus the US invaded 35 years ago.He also said his country was seeking free passage through the canal for its navy ships – which Donald Trump had said were “severely overcharged and not treated fairly in any way, shape or form”.Trump, since coming to power in January, has repeatedly claimed that China has too much influence over the canal, which handles about 40% of US container traffic and 5% of world trade.His administration has vowed to “take back” control of the strategic waterway that the US funded, built and controlled until 1999.Hegseth suggested on Wednesday the former US military bases that dot Panama could be used again to host American troops.He said a deal signed with Panama this week was an “opportunity to revive, whether it’s the military base, naval air station, locations where US troops can work with Panamanian troops to enhance capabilities and cooperate in a rotational way”.While Hegseth cited the possibility of joint exercises, the mention of a rotational force was likely to raise the hackles of Panamanians, for whom sole ownership of the canal is a source of national pride.The US has long participated in military exercises in Panama. However, a longer-term rotational force – such as the force the USmaintains in Darwin, Australia – is politically toxic for Panama’s centre-right leader, José Raúl Mulino.His government quickly slapped down the idea. “Panama made clear, through President Mulino, that we cannot accept military bases or defence sites,” said Panama’s security minister, Frank Abrego, in a joint public appearance with Hegseth.Hegseth also said the US was seeking an agreement under which its warships could pass through the canal “first, and free”.Jose Ramón Icaza, Panama’s minister for canal affairs, said: “We will seek a mechanism by which warships and auxiliary ships can have a compensation system for services, that is, a way to make them cost-neutral but not free.”The independent Panama Canal Authority (PCA) that manages the waterway said on Wednesday that it was seeking a “cost-neutral scheme” to compensate services rendered in security matters for warship tolls.Under current treaties, the canal is open to all countries and vessels must pay the same rates according to their capacity and cargo, regardless of their country of origin or destination.The PCA said the US recognised Panamanian sovereignty over the waterway, although Hegseth did not mention it in the news conference.The Pentagon chief’s two-day visit has been peppered with comments about China and its influence in Latin America. He said the US was not looking for war with China but would counter Beijing’s “threats” to the region.“We do not seek war with China. And war with China is certainly not inevitable. We do not seek it in any form,” Hegseth said. “But together, we must prevent war by robustly and vigorously deterring China’s threats in this hemisphere,” the former Fox News anchor said.China hit back after Hegseth’s comments, saying Washington officials “maliciously attacked China … exposing the US’s bullying nature”.Trump has zeroed in on the role of a Hong Kong company that has operated ports at either end of the canal linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans for decades.Hegseth asserted that China-based companies were also capturing Latin American land and infrastructure in strategic sectors, such as energy and telecommunications, and that China had too large a military presence in the hemisphere.“Make no mistake, Beijing is investing and operating in this region for military advantage and unfair economic gain,” he said.Under pressure from the White House, Panama has accused the Hong Kong-backed Panama Ports Company of failing to meet its contractual obligations and pushed for it to pull out of the country.The company rejected an audit on Wednesday that suggested it had failed to pay $1.2bn due under its concession.The ports’ parent company, CK Hutchison, announced last month a deal to offload 43 ports in 23 countries – including its two on the Panama canal – to a consortium led by the US asset manager BlackRock for $19bn in cash. A furious Beijing has since announced an antitrust review of the deal.The US invaded Panama in 1989 to oust the dictator Manuel Noriega, killing more than 500 Panamanians and razing parts of the capital. More

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      ‘They tricked us’: migrants who braved the Darién Gap forced home by Trump deal

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      Outside the Lajas Blancas migrant camp in southern Panama, wooden shops are boarded up. A bed of cold ash lies in an iron drum barbecue which once served meat skewers to hungry migrants.Six months ago, hundreds of people would pass through the camp every day, emerging from the jungles of the Darién Gap between Colombia and Panama to receive humanitarian aid, before continuing their journey north towards the US.Now, however, migration through the gap has slowed to a trickle and the footfall is in the opposite direction, as many migrants from South America try to return home.Adriangela Contreras was one of 300,000 migrants to make the perilous crossing in 2024, carrying her two-year-old daughter, Arianna, as she stepped over dead bodies on the trail.She arrived at Lajas Blancas in November amid a crackdown by Panamanian authorities who rolled out barbed wire in the jungle and introduced biometric tests at the border.Under a $6m agreement with the US, hundreds of migrants from Colombia and Ecuador were returned to their home countries on deportation flights.Most Venezuelans were allowed to proceed, however, and Contreras’ group made it as far as southern Mexico, sleeping in the street and selling candies or washing windscreens to earn bus fares. But when on his first day in office Donald Trump shut down the CBP One app used by asylum seekers to request appointments, Contreras felt she had little option but to retrace her steps.“I’m so disappointed, I didn’t [decide to migrate] for myself but for my family,” she said. “Now I just want to go home, it’s been a long and difficult journey.”The shutdown of CBP One and the increased Panamanian controls have all but extinguished the Darién migrant route.In February, crossings were down 96% compared with the previous year. At the end of that month Lajas Blancas – which once regularly sheltered over 3,000 migrants in plywood buildings and tents – held just 485 migrants, 90% of whom had come from the north.So far this year, 4,091 migrants have returned to Panama and the government has struggled to deal with the logistics of this reverse flow.Oscar Ramírez, a 52-year-old Venezuelan, arrived at Lajas Blancas with barely $1 in his pocket. He had sold his truck to follow the “American dream”, but said he was robbed in Mexico City and then held prisoner by people smugglers in a hotel near Monterrey. “The only thing sure about Mexico is that you will be mugged,” he said.When he eventually made it into the US he was arrested by Ice that same morning and detained for three months before being deported to Villahermosa, Mexico, in January.“They tricked us,” he said, “they told us we would be able to get a repatriation flight from Panama.”Many of the migrants, including Contreras, say they were promised that, upon reaching Panama, they would be offered a place on a plane to Cúcuta, a Colombian city on the border with Venezuela.When the flight never materialized, some migrants who could afford it began taking small boats back to Colombia. On 22 February, a boat containing 19 migrants capsized and a nine-year-old Venezuelan girl drowned.Since then, the Panamanian government has introduced a new route, bussing migrants from Lajas Blancas to Miramar, a port on the Caribbean coast, and boarding them on to ferries to La Miel, an isolated village close to the Colombian border.“It was a horrible experience,” said Jessica Álvarez, who had never been on a boat before. “There were times when I thought we were going to turn over, it was really scary. I vomited and my son was really sick, everyone was so seasick.”From La Miel the migrants are sent on small boats to the villages of Capurganá and then Necoclí in Colombian territory. From there many, including Álvarez, have opted to stay with friends or family in Colombian cities.But Contreras and her daughter remain stuck in Necoclí.“When we first arrived they gave us nothing, not a bite to eat, not a mattress, nothing,” she said, speaking by phone from the Colombian port. With the help of some friends she managed to find a space on the floor of a guesthouse, but she is unsure how she will raise the money to return to Venezuela to see her son who recently underwent eye surgery.“I just want to be back with my family. I hope Venezuela has something better in store for me,” she said.The presidents of Panama and Colombia will meet in Panama City on 28 March with migration at the top of the agenda. Humanitarian aid agencies have started to depart Lajas Blancas, which is due to be closed in the coming weeks. Any further migrants arriving through the Darién Gap will be immediately deported to their home country or to Colombia, according to Panama’s ministry of public security.Ramírez had the funds to pay for a bus to Cúcuta and by Wednesday was back with his family in the state of Barinas. Over the phone he said he was happy to be home, even if he no longer had his truck.“Us migrants, we all had the same thing in our heads, the American dream,” he said. “But after the things we lived, I realized it’s just that: a dream.” More

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      US deportees moved from Panama City to Darién jungle region, lawyer says

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      A group of immigrants deported from the US to Panama last week have been moved from a hotel in the capital to the Darién jungle region in the south of the country, according to a lawyer representing an immigrant family.Susana Sabalza, a Panamanian immigration lawyer, said a family she represents was transferred to Metetí, a town in the Darién, along with other deported people. La Estrella de Panamá, a local daily, reported on Wednesday that 170 of the 299 people who had been in the hotel had been moved to the Darién.Panama’s government did not respond to a request for comment.The 299 immigrants had been staying at a hotel in Panama City under the protection of local authorities and with the financial support of the United States through the UN-related International Organization for Migration and the UN refugee agency, according to the Panamanian government.Immigrants in the hotel were not allowed to leave, and at least one person tried to kill themselves, while another broke his leg trying to escape, according to media reports.Panama’s migration service said on Wednesday that a Chinese woman had escaped from the hotel. It asked her to return and accused unspecified people outside the hotel of aiding his escape.On Wednesday afternoon there were still migrants on the hotel. One family came to a window and gestured to a journalist outside they had no phone. Police later came to move reporters away from the hotel.The group includes people from Afghanistan, China, India, Iran, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Turkey, Uzbekistan and Vietnam, according to Panama’s president, José Raúl Mulino, who has agreed with the US to receive non-Panamanian deportees. The deportation of non-Panamanian immigrants to Panama is part of the Trump administration’s attempt to ramp up deportations of people living in the US illegally.One of the challenges to Trump’s plan is that some people come from countries that refuse to accept US deportation flights, due to strained diplomatic relations or other reasons. The arrangement with Panama allows the US to deport people of these nationalities and makes it Panama’s responsibility to organize their onward repatriation. Human rights groups have warned that immigrants risk mistreatment and may be endangered if they are ultimately returned to violent or war-torn countries of origin, such as Afghanistan.Sabalza said she had not been able to see her clients while they were held at the hotel in Panama City and she is seeking permission to visit them at their new location. She declined to identify their nationality, but said they were a Muslim family who “could be decapitated” if they returned home.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionSabalza said the family would be requesting asylum in Panama or “any country that will receive them other than their own”.Mulino said previously the immigrants would be moved to a shelter in the Darién region, which includes the dense and lawless jungle separating Central America from South America that has in recent years become a corridor for hundreds of thousands of people aiming to reach the United States. Panama’s security minister said on Tuesday that more than half of the people deported from the United States in recent days had accepted voluntary repatriations to their home countries.With reporting by Reuters More

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      U.S. Deports Migrants From Asia to Panama

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      The move could herald a new front in the Trump administration’s plans for mass deportations, one that allows for more rapid removal of migrants whose home countries are reluctant to accept them.The Trump administration deported migrants from several Asian nations to Panama on Wednesday night, Panamanian and U.S. officials said, in a move that could signal much faster removals of immigrants who have remained in the United States because their countries have made it difficult to return them.The flight carrying the migrants, a military plane that took off from California, appears to be the first of its kind during the Trump administration. It came on the heels of Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s visit last week to Panama, which has been under tremendous pressure from President Trump over how it runs the Panama Canal.The more than 100 migrants on the flight, including families, had entered the United States illegally from countries such as Afghanistan, China, Pakistan and Uzbekistan. It is often difficult for the United States to return migrants to those nations.President José Raúl Mulino of Panama, speaking at a news conference on Thursday morning, said 119 people of “the most diverse nationalities in the world” had arrived the night before on a U.S. Air Force flight at an airport outside Panama City.Mr. Mulino said they were being housed in a local hotel and would be moved to a shelter in Darién, a province in Panama’s east, a process managed by the International Organization for Migration. From there, he said, they would be repatriated.“We hope to get them out of there as soon as possible on flights from the United States,” Mr. Mulino said, adding, “This is another contribution Panama is making on the migration issue.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Elecciones en Panamá: la figura más prominente de la contienda no está en la boleta

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      El país centroamericano se dirige a las urnas el domingo para elegir a un nuevo líder tras una campaña que ha sido influida por un expresidente convicto que solicitó asilo en la embajada de Nicaragua.Las elecciones presidenciales de Panamá del domingo están ante una situación peculiar: la figura más prominente de la contienda no está en la papeleta de votación.Ricardo Martinelli, un expresidente de la nación centroamericana y conocido por sus simpatizantes como “el Loco”, había sido uno de los principales contendientes hasta que fue inhabilitado por una condena por blanqueo de capitales.Pero desde la embajada de Nicaragua en Ciudad de Panamá, donde se le otorgó asilo, Martinelli ha estado haciendo una intensa campaña por José Raúl Mulino, un exministro de Seguridad Pública que era su compañero de fórmula y que ahora ha tomado su lugar en la papeleta.Mulino ha encabezado las encuestas entre los ocho candidatos, prometiendo regresar a Panamá al crecimiento económico que experimentó bajo el mandato de Martinelli, quien fue presidente del país de 2009 a 2014.“Todos con el loco y el loco con Mulino”, dice un jingle en un canal de TikTok para simpatizantes de Martinelli.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Most Prominent Voice in Panama’s Election Isn’t on the Ballot

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      The Central American nation heads to the polls on Sunday to elect a new leader after a campaign influenced by a convicted former president who has sought refuge in Nicaragua’s Embassy.Panama is holding a presidential election on Sunday while facing an odd situation: The most prominent player in the race is not on the ballot.Ricardo Martinelli, a former president of the Central American nation and known to his supporters as “El loco,” or the crazy one, had been a top contender until he was disqualified because of a money laundering conviction.But from inside the Nicaraguan Embassy in Panama City where he was granted asylum, Mr. Martinelli has been strenuously campaigning for José Raúl Mulino, a former public security minister who was his running mate and took his place on the ballot.Mr. Mulino has led the polls in a field of eight candidates, vowing to return Panama to the economic growth it experienced under Mr. Martinelli, who was president from 2009 to 2014.Political chaos has characterized the election, which takes place amid widespread frustration with the current government and in the aftermath of major protests last year against a copper-mining contract that demonstrators said would damage the environment.The candidates are competing for a five-year term in a single-round vote — whoever receives the highest percentage of votes wins. Voters will also be choosing representatives for the National Assembly and local governments.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Migration Through Darien

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      On Friday, boat companies began operating in Colombia after a five-day pause, allowing migrants to once again make their way through the notorious jungle terrain and continue toward the U.S. border.Migration toward the United States through the perilous jungle known as the Darién Gap returned to normal on Friday, with hundreds of people from Venezuela, Ecuador and beyond entering the jungle following a roughly five-day pause in which migrants could not begin the trek.The pause in this increasingly large migration flow was the result of an arrest operation led by the Colombian prosecutor’s office, in which two captains driving boats full of migrants headed to the jungle were taken into custody, where they remain, according to the prosecutor’s office. The office said that the captains had been transporting the individuals illegally, in part because the migrants did not carry proper documentation.The captains worked for two boat companies — Katamaranes and Caribe — that for years have been playing an essential role in carrying migrants from the northern Colombia community of Necoclí about two hours across a gulf to the entrance to the jungle, which they must then cross to get to Central America and eventually the United States. The boat companies have been doing this openly — something documented extensively by The New York Times — and the arrests seemed to signal a shift in policy by Colombian authorities.But in retaliation for the arrests, the boat companies paused transport, and the number of migrants waiting around in Necoclí and another exit town, Turbo, swelled quickly to several thousand people. That posed an enormous challenge to both towns, which do not have the resources or infrastructure to house and feed so many people for an extended amount of time.The arrests of the boat operators came after months of pressure by the United States on the Colombian government to do more to limit or stop migration through the Darién. In a recent interview, Hugo Tovar, a Colombian prosecutor, said his office was working diligently, with the help of the United States, to investigate and arrest human traffickers.On Friday, Johann Wachter, secretary of the Necoclí municipal government, said that the boat companies decided to restart operations after a meeting between representatives from the boat companies, local governments, the Colombian national migration office and other agencies, including someone from the U.S. Embassy in Colombia.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More