Word: panama
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...past and future of the Panama Canal weigh heavily on Martín Torrijos, like a freighter inching through a lock. It was Torrijos' father, the late Panamanian strongman Brigadier General Omar Torrijos, who persuaded the U.S. to sign a 1977 treaty handing over the canal to Panama, which it did six years ago. Now Torrijos, 43, who was democratically elected President of Panama in 2004, is stumping to persuade his countrymen to undertake a more than $5 billion expansion of the 50-mile-long waterway that bisects the isthmus...
...project--which voters look set to approve in an Oct. 22 referendum--may not compare with the big dig that created the canal a century ago, but Torrijos insists it is no less urgent, both for international shipping and Panama's development. "My dad solved the struggle for ownership," Torrijos told TIME. "My generation's challenge is to make better economic and social use of this geographical position history...
...locks, wide enough to serve the supersize, post-Panamax vessels--those carrying more than 5,000 20-ft.-long containers--that many consider the future of commercial-cargo shipping. The canal's Old World competitor, Egypt's Suez Canal, can already accommodate the bigger vessels. A resized Panama Canal could be a boon to U.S. ports on the Gulf and East coasts, which currently handle post-Panamax cargo directly to and from Asia only via the lengthier Suez route. Says Gary LaGrange, CEO of the Port of New Orleans: "This will be monumental for maritime trade on the Gulf Coast...
...expansion, set to be completed in the canal's centennial year, 2014, could also mark the nation's coming of age. It's a chance, say officials, to shed once and for all Panama's 20th century image as a U.S. lapdog and bolster its bid to become the hemisphere's Hong Kong--a world-class maritime, financial and commercial center for everything from foreign-exchange banking to aviation services...
...Despite his globetrotting past, Posada is now, much to the U.S. Government's dismay, a man without a country. Since his arrest last year, officials in seven countries - Canada, Honduras, Costa Rica, Panama, El Salvador, Mexico and Guatemala - all have told him to forget about moving to their homeland. The notable exceptions were Cuba and its ally Venezuela, which both said they would welcome him. But the court previously found those countries likely would torture him. So the U.S. has found itself in the uncomfortable position of not having a place to deport Posada, but no longer being constitutionally able...