Washington challenges Beijing's ties to Latin America
The World
PRX
4.6 • 943 Ratings
🗓️ 4 February 2025
⏱️ 49 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Panama has become the first Latin American nation to pull out of China’s Belt and Road Initiative. It’s also weighing whether to cancel its contract with the Hong Kong-based company that operates near the Panama Canal. An adviser to the US Institute for Peace says that it's all part of the long rivalry between the US and China in Latin America. Also, Syria's new interim president is traveling to Turkey to meet with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. There's a lot at stake for both countries. Turkey, which hosts more than 3 million Syrian refugees, wants a stable Syria next door. And Syria's new government is looking for support to help rebuild the war-torn nation. And, we meet the man considered to be the first English teacher in Japan. He staged a shipwreck to get into the country, despite the isolationist policies of the time.
Listen to today’s Music Heard on Air.
Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choicesTranscript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Panama says maybe not to China. The Trump administration is calling that a victory. It's a choice for Latin America, move forward with the U.S. or with China. These are both critically important partners. I'm Marco Wormon. More today on the competition between Washington and Beijing for influence in Latin America, and how those private messages on your smartphone might not be so secure. |
| 0:28.1 | To me, it remains astonishing that more muscular measures are not taken against the companies who make a business of hacking American companies and in many cases facilitating the hacking of Americans. |
| 0:39.7 | Plus, in Norway, authorities are doing what they can |
| 0:41.9 | to protect wild Atlantic salmon from some serious threats. |
| 0:46.3 | On the top of the list, climate change and farmed fish |
| 0:50.5 | has been the major risk factors. |
| 0:53.1 | That's all ahead today, here on the world. |
| 0:58.0 | This is the world. I'm Marco Werman. Carolyn Beeler is out today. Thank you for spending part of |
| 1:02.9 | your Tuesday here. Panama says it will not renew its participation in China's Belt and Road |
| 1:08.2 | initiative. U.S. Secretary of State State Marco Rubio, who just visited Panama |
| 1:12.1 | this week, is applauding that announcement. Panamanian officials are reportedly also reconsidering |
| 1:17.5 | their contract with a Hong Kong-based company that operates ports near the Panama Canal. All this |
| 1:23.2 | would be a major concession to President Trump, who has complained about China's influence over the |
| 1:28.0 | strategic waterway. China's Belt and Road Initiative is the signature foreign policy project |
| 1:33.1 | of Chinese leader Xi Jinping. We asked Margaret Myers to talk through the significance of Panama's |
| 1:38.6 | decision. She's a senior advisor at the United States Institute of Peace. Well, this would be a major |
| 1:44.0 | development in the |
| 1:45.3 | Panama-China relationship, but also in terms of China's broader engagement with the Latin |
| 1:49.1 | American region. The region has been a sort of newcomer to the Belt and Road initiative with |
| 1:54.5 | the first ever Belt and Road agreement, which is essentially a memorandum of understanding, signed by |
| 2:00.5 | Panama in 2017, |
| 2:02.6 | followed by several other agreements across the region with most all of the countries in Latin |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from PRX, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of PRX and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.