Trump targets Hong Kong company in world purge

Mark Pinkstone/Former Chief Information Officer of HK government

The American dictatorship of President Donald Trump and his sidekick, Secretary of State Marco Rubio is nothing short of a litany of lies told to Panamanian President Jose Raul Mulino to break off Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) ties with China.

Before taking over the presidency of the US, Trump told the press, “China is running the Panama Canal that was not given to China, that was given to Panama foolishly, but they violated the agreement, and we’re going to take it back, or something very powerful is going to happen,”

With that mindset, Trump sent China hawk Rubio off to Panama with the threat of taking back the canal unless the Chinese were kicked out.

The only problem with the plan is that China has never had any interest, let alone control over the Panama Canal.

A sole Hong Kong conglomerate, Hutchison Port Holdings, controlled by Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing, has two ports at either end of the canal operated by its subsidiary Panama Ports Company. There are also three other ports along the canal operated by private companies, all of which are used for loading and unloading cargo and providing fuel for vessels vying the waterway. They have no control over which vessels can use the canal, nor do they collect tolls for its use. This is the responsibility of the Panama Canal Authority, whose administrator, deputy administrator, and 11-member board are selected by Panama’s government but operate independently.

Hutchison Port Holdings (PH) is the world’s largest port operator across Europe, the Americas, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. It operates in five of the seven busiest container ports in the world, handling 13 per cent of the world's container traffic. Revenue in 2023 amounted to US$4.2 billion.

HPH has routinely topped the list of port terminal operators ever since it expanded worldwide in 1991. It currently operates nearly 300 berths across 48 important ports around the world including the Port of Barcelona, Port of Buenos Aires, Port of Busan, the Thames Port of London, and the Port of Botany (Sydney)

During his visit to Panama, Rubio wrote in a post on X that "the United States cannot, and will not, allow the Chinese Communist Party to continue with its effective and growing control over the Panama Canal area."

Trump has complained that China exerts control over the canal and charges the U.S. ships six-figure premiums to cross Panama's isthmus. The canal was built over several decades by the U.S. and completed in 1914 but handed over to Panama during the Carter administration.

Immediately after Rubio’s fleeting visit to the central American country, President Mulino said Panama would not renew participation in China’s BRI and two Panamanian lawyers filed a complaint in the country’s Supreme Court to cancel the concession of Hutchison’s two ports on the canal. Mulino also ordered an audit into the company.

Mulino, after the talks with Rubio, dismissed any immediate threat of US retaliation and reiterated Panama’s ownership of the canal. He ruled out any negotiations with the US over the canal’s control. Chinese officials, on the other hand, have expressed that they have always respected Panama’s sovereignty and have no intention of infringing on it.

The BRI, launched by China in 2013, aims to build infrastructure and improve global trade. Panama was the first Latin American country to sign on to the initiative, and as part of the scheme, a two-party Chinese-led consortium is building a US$1.3 billion bridge over the waterway.

"The announcement by President Jose Raul Mulino that Panama will allow its participation in the CCP's Belt and Road Initiative to expire is a great step forward for US -Panama relations, a free Panama Canal, and another example of POTUS (President of the United States) leadership to protect our national security and deliver prosperity for the American people," Rubio posted on X after departing the country and hailing his visit as a “great success.”

Norman Castro, one of the lawyers in the case brought before the Supreme Court, told reporters the contract "violates what the constitution says in about 10 articles."

"After a detailed analysis of the contract... we decided that an action for unconstitutionality was the appropriate means" to challenge the concession," said Julio Macias, another lawyer behind the suit.

The complaint also accuses the Hong Kong subsidiary of not paying taxes and benefits due to a series of advantages that are allegedly against the law. So far, no evidence has been offered to back up the allegations, but it will be required for the courts. Time will tell.

There were also allegations of corruption which prompted Mulino to order an investigation into the company.

Such is the strength of the venom Rubio spews up to get his way. Hopefully, the Mulino investigations and court actions will reveal the truth: that Hutchison Ports is just a bona fide company, conducting its business in a respectful and peaceful way as it does with dozens of companies around the world.

The attack on Hutchison is nothing more but a show of sinophilia paranoia by the so-called most powerful man on Earth, Donald Trump, and lacky Marco Rubio. Together, they are stalking the world like a bull in a china shop, using bullying tactics to force the world leaders to their knees in a kowtow manner.

On his Truth Social network, Trump has also claimed – without proof – that Chinese soldiers have been deployed to the canal and that “Panama is, with great speed attempting to take down the 64 per cent of signs which are written in Chinese. “They are all over the Zone,” he said.

But the “Zone” – a former American enclave bordering the canal – hasn’t existed since 1979.
Prime US TV network CNN fact-checking Trumps usual blabberings said that if the scenario Trump describes sounds like the plot of a movie, well, it was. In the 2001 movie “The Tailor of Panama,” which starred Pierce Brosnan and Geoffrey Rush, the US invaded Panama after receiving bogus intelligence that China was trying to secretly buy the canal.

Mark Pinkstone

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Mark Pinkstone/Former Chief Information Officer of HK government

While Apple Daily publisher Jimmy Lai continues his testimony pleading his innocence in his sedition and collusion with foreign forces trial, former US Vice President Mike Pence called for his release, and US lawmakers introduced a bill asking President Trump to review imposing sanctions on Hong Kong officials for human rights violations.

On January 23, speaking in Hong Kong at the UBS Wealth Insights summit, Pence called for the release of Lai with, “there is probably no more compelling gesture in the short term to send a message of good will to the people of the United States, or the free world, than if China were to take steps to free Jimmy Lai.”

Pence is a lawyer and should know better. A person cannot be released during a trial just on the whim of a friend. In fact, Pence offered no evidence why Lai should be released and in reality, he was using Lai as a political weapon, as he had done with the USB summit.

Pence’s comment at a supposedly financial conference, drew the ire of the Hong Kong SAR government which said the remark was "a shameless interference with the course of justice and on Hong Kong's righteous efforts in safeguarding national security".

Earlier, the Chief Justice, Andrew Cheung, hit out at critics undermining the rule of law in Hong Kong during the opening of the Legal Year by describing the politization of the Court as “deplorable.”

Why do the Americans insist on meddling in Hong Kong affairs on matters that do not concern them? A Hong Kong SAR Government spokesman said Pence's comments were intended "to influence the fairness of the trial with malicious intent".

It’s part of the US DNA to interfere in everybody’s business.

If Hong Kong commented on Trumps pardoning of the Capitol Hill assault, which made him complicit in the riots, the US administration would have immediately imposed sanctions on Hong Kong.

Pence and Lai are old friends and Lai admitted in court that he had visited Pence in the White House along with other government officials, including warmonger Mike Pompeo. But he denied asking them to sanction Hong Kong or mainland officials.

Lai also has the full support of Trump who had been asked by the press if he would request Chinese President Xi Jinping to free Lai. He replied: “100 per cent I will get him out.”

And just before arriving in Hong Kong, Pence made a stopover in Taiwan and called on President Trump to renew his pledge to support Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion.

Speaking during the Taiwan visit on January 17, Pence said China’s annexation of the island would impact global trade, technology and nuclear proliferation.

After listening to the Wall Street Journal’s Editorial Report on Saturday, one gets the feeling that all of America firmly believes that Jimmy Lai has done no wrong. That is because the US public does not seek information on the outside world, unless it is provided by the US propaganda machine. It is so slick that the everyday American believes whatever is fed to them by the MSM (mainstream media) including the Washington Post, now owned by Jeff Bezos, a Trump supporter, the Wall Street Journal and New York Post, owned by Rupert Murdock, who also owns Fox News and another Trump supporter etc. It therefore comes as no surprise that Trump was elected President with such heavy media support brainwashing the American public.

Meanwhile, the House of China-bashers (aka the House of Representatives) have decided to start the New Year afresh with a blast by introducing a bill requiring the Trump administration to review whether Hong Kong officials should be sanctioned for human rights violations.

The "Hong Kong Sanctions Act" requires the U.S. president to determine whether dozens of Hong Kong officials violated human rights and whether sanctions should be imposed under legislation including the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act, Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act of 2019 or the Hong Kong Autonomy Act.

On the 33day of his defence testimony, Lai told the court that he only had a “vague” understanding of the Magnitsky Act and denied that he was asking Washington to impose sanctions on Hong Kong through his correspondences with former US officials.
Indeed, most of the month has been a busy one for the China bashers as we enter the Year of the Snake. If the doomsday prophets continue on this path, the snake may turn around and bite them.