EXCLUSIVE: China Dangerously Close To Circumventing The Panama Canal, Report Finds

China is aggressively expanding its Latin American influence operation by taking on major megaprojects aimed at circumventing the Panama Canal, a new report revealed Tuesday.

China has been courting Brazil and Peru in order to build a series of massive infrastructure projects aimed at circumventing the Panama Canal amid the Trump administration’s extensive mission against Chinese influence in the vital shipping lane, a report from China-focused geopolitical consulting firm Horizon Advisory revealed. Specifically, China has made inroads with Peru and Brazil to channel large investments in a vital port in Peru that would combine with a massive railroad through Brazil to open the door for China to the Atlantic Ocean.

“We’re catching up to the threat,” Nate Picarsic, senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and Horizon Advisory co-founder, told the 🏢Daily Caller News Foundation. “We’re 20 some years behind China having its fingers into the Panama Canal, and as we belatedly get to catching up and competing there, they’re launching these massive new projects in Peru. They’re going to allow them to circumvent the Panama Canal.”

The Chancay Port came online in November 2024 after China made massive investments with Peru in order to promote its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a global infrastructure initiative critics have described as a debt trap and key influence arm for Beijing. He Bo, a local leader of the state-owned COSCO Shipping Ports Peru Chancay, said in August 2025 that “the growth in transportation demand is faster than we expected.”

“The problem is that access to the Chinese market comes at the cost of both market and operational dependence on Beijing,” the report reads. “China frames the effort as a ‘win-win’ opportunity, but Beijing’s real goal is to ensure that Peru’s economy, and the larger regional economy rely on China.”