China urges T&T not to be “blinded” by US as Panama Canal dispute escalates

Akash Sama­roo

Chi­na is urg­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go and oth­er coun­tries back­ing the Unit­ed States in the Pana­ma Canal dis­pute not to be “blind­ed” or used to ad­vance US in­ter­ests in the es­ca­lat­ing diplo­mat­ic stand­off.

T&T has joined the US and five oth­er coun­tries in a strong­ly word­ed joint state­ment warn­ing against what they de­scribe as Chi­na’s “tar­get­ed eco­nom­ic pres­sure” and ac­tions af­fect­ing Pana­ma-flagged ves­sels.

How­ev­er, Chi­na has fired back, call­ing the state­ment a “sheer lie.”

In the US-led state­ment, is­sued along­side Bo­livia, Cos­ta Ri­ca, Guyana and Paraguay, the group reaf­firmed that “the free­dom of our re­gion is non-ne­go­tiable,” in what can be seen as sig­nalling a unit­ed hemi­spher­ic stance on mar­itime trade and sov­er­eign­ty.

These coun­tries are among the mem­bers of the re­cent­ly formed Shield of the Amer­i­c­as coali­tion.

Cur­rent­ly, there is a diplo­mat­ic stand­off over con­trol of the Pana­ma Canal’s key ports. Fol­low­ing a Jan­u­ary 2026 court rul­ing that stripped a Hong Kong-based com­pa­ny, CK Hutchi­son, of its long-stand­ing port con­ces­sions due to con­sti­tu­tion­al con­cerns, Pana­ma trans­ferred these op­er­a­tions to West­ern-af­fil­i­at­ed firms.

Chi­na viewed this move as an "un­law­ful seizure" and al­leged­ly re­tal­i­at­ed by ag­gres­sive­ly de­tain­ing and in­spect­ing dozens of Pana­ma-flagged ves­sels in Chi­nese ports to ex­ert eco­nom­ic pres­sure.

The coun­tries that signed the state­ment said they are “mon­i­tor­ing with vig­i­lance” de­vel­op­ments in­volv­ing Chi­na, par­tic­u­lar­ly in the wake of a de­ci­sion by Pana­ma’s Supreme Court re­lat­ed to op­er­a­tions at the Bal­boa and Cristóbal ter­mi­nals.

The Pana­ma Supreme Court ruled in Jan­u­ary 2026 that the long-stand­ing con­ces­sion for CK Hutchi­son to op­er­ate the Bal­boa and Cristóbal port ter­mi­nals was un­con­sti­tu­tion­al, cit­ing ir­reg­u­lar­i­ties and dis­pro­por­tion­ate ben­e­fits that harmed state in­ter­ests.

In the joint state­ment, they char­ac­terised the fall­out as a “bla­tant at­tempt to politi­cise mar­itime trade” and warned it could in­fringe on the sov­er­eign­ty of states across the Amer­i­c­as.

“Pana­ma is a pil­lar of our mar­itime trad­ing sys­tem, and as such must re­main free from any un­due ex­ter­nal pres­sure,” the state­ment said, adding that any at­tempt to un­der­mine that sov­er­eign­ty would be viewed as a threat to all sig­na­to­ries.

The coali­tion al­so de­clared its “sol­i­dar­i­ty with Pana­ma,” fram­ing the is­sue as part of a broad­er com­mit­ment to re­gion­al peace, se­cu­ri­ty and co­op­er­a­tion.

Over the years, Trinidad and To­ba­go has main­tained close eco­nom­ic ties with Chi­na, ben­e­fit­ing from in­fra­struc­ture fi­nanc­ing, con­struc­tion projects and bi­lat­er­al trade agree­ments, even as it bal­ances re­la­tions with tra­di­tion­al West­ern part­ners.

Sev­er­al ef­forts to con­tact For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers for com­ment on the state­ment were un­suc­cess­ful.

The joint de­c­la­ra­tion comes amid height­ened scruti­ny of Chi­na’s role in glob­al trade routes and strate­gic in­fra­struc­ture, par­tic­u­lar­ly in Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean, where Bei­jing has ex­pand­ed its foot­print in re­cent years.

But Chi­na’s Min­istry of For­eign Af­fairs is call­ing on coun­tries sup­port­ing the US not to be “blind­ed and utilised” by the US.

In a post on X, the min­istry asked, “Who ex­act­ly ex­ert­ed long forcible con­trol of the Pana­ma Canal, in­vad­ed Pana­ma and tram­pled on Pana­ma’s sov­er­eign­ty and dig­ni­ty? Who ex­act­ly is cov­et­ing the Pana­ma Canal, try­ing to own an in­ter­na­tion­al wa­ter­way and dis­re­spect­ing the sov­er­eign­ty of coun­tries in the re­gion? The an­swer is rather clear.”

Don­ald Trump has ex­pressed a de­sire to re­claim the Pana­ma Canal for the Unit­ed States, call­ing the 1977 treaty that hand­ed it over a "big mis­take" and threat­en­ing to "take it back" to pre­vent what he de­scribes as hos­tile for­eign in­flu­ence.

The For­eign Af­fairs Min­istry said, “Chi­na’s po­si­tion on the Pana­ma ports is­sue is clear and will firm­ly de­fend its le­git­i­mate rights and in­ter­ests. We urge rel­e­vant coun­tries not to be blind­ed and utilised by the U.S. side.”