China–Panama relations
After the Chinese Civil War in 1949, relations were maintained with the Nationalist government of the ROC which retreated to the island of Taiwan, a former Qing province and later a dependency of the Empire of Japan that ruled from 1895 to 1945.It has also been kept confidential who delivered the letter and assisted in the switchover process, which is only described as "a distinguished member of the Chinese community living in Panama".In 2018, the first flight from Beijing To Panama by Air China landed in Tocumen International Airport, with a technical stop in Houston.Due to this new route, the Panamanian ministry of tourism expected at least 40,000 Chinese tourist visits per year.As a result, Panama City was almost immediately added to China's list of officially approved tourist destinations.[3][4][5][6] The Chinese Communist Party (or government) has offered the Panameñista party-led government a free feasibility study for the planned 4th set of locks in the Panama Canal in order to gain a competitive advantage in bids for choosing the company to build the locks, not to mention plans for a 1200-hectare industrial park on the Pacific coast and a 4-hectare campus in Amador near the Biomuseo to house the People's Republic of China (PRC)'s embassy in Panama.A Panamanian government agency later said that the switchover was because of Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen's violations and un-acknowledgement of the 1992 consensus regarding China, Taiwan and the One-China policy.In Portugal, numerous companies have been bought by Chinese companies, with Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa saying that "In Portugal, we are not anxious by the origin of foreign investment" and asked Europe to eschew "the path of protectionism" as EU countries agreed upon a framework regulating foreign investment, specially from China.China has given Panama the status of Most Favored Nation, which means that Panamanian ships get special treatment at Chinese ports.The Panama–David railway will be built by China, having a maximum speed of 160 km/h (the original plan called for 300 km/h), with a length of over 400 km and a cost of over 5 billion dollars, 85% of which will be paid with a loan from a Chinese state-owned bank.