Panama hopes China's COSCO will resume operations at Balboa port

"All cargo is important, and certainly COSCO's cargo is important for us, for Panama, and we obviously hope that they will reconsider that decision not to use the port of Balboa."

Balboa is one of the two ports at the centre of a year-long saga involving Washington, Beijing and the Panamanian Government. The move follows a ruling by Panama's Supreme Court in late ​January that annulled the contract to operate the port held by ⁠a unit of Hong Kong's CK Hutchison.

APM Terminals, a unit of Maersk, ​recently began temporarily operating the port for a period of up to 18 months.

(Reporting by Elida Moreno, Writing by Daina Beth Solomon, Editing by Natalia Siniawski)