Shipping Panama

American companies in Panama shut their offices Wednesday and checked on employees' safety, as the U.S. military's attack sent the Central American nation's deeply troubled economy into chaos. With sporadic fighting continuing, Panama's main airport remained shut to commercial traffic, and the Panama Canal was closed for most of the day, its first combat-related closure in 75 years. A spot check of U.S.

Twenty tons of cocaine seized off the Pacific coast of Panama over the weekend were believed headed to a Mexican port for delivery to the notorious Sinaloa cartel, U.S. officials said Tuesday. The seizure Sunday of drugs valued at more than $275 million wholesale was described by the officials as the largest recorded maritime cocaine bust. The drugs were believed to have been purchased by Ismael Zambada, a suspected leader of Mexico's so-called Sinaloa cartel, officials said.

No drugs were found aboard the H. V. Hermann, a Cuban-chartered freighter that was attacked by the U.S. Coast Guard after refusing to submit to a search in international waters, the Mexican navy said Thursday. "Nothing has been found after a round-the-clock inspection that began at 8:40 Wednesday morning, when the Hermann was received by Mexican naval vessels," a navy spokesman said. The Panamanian-registered freighter was struck by cannon and machine-gun rounds fired by the U.S.

Warren White and his son were swimming just off the beach when they saw it. About 16 feet below them, a mass of coral and rock reared up from the sandy bottom. On top, in plain view, sat two coral-encrusted cannons. "Look at those guns," White thought. "Those things are ancient." So ancient, in fact, that White and a handful of scholars have come to believe that the wreck is one of Christopher Columbus' ships, the Vizcaina, abandoned in 1503 during his last voyage.

President Bush, trying to tighten the economic screws on Panama's Gen. Manuel A. Noriega "and his puppet regime," Thursday banned Panamanian-flag vessels from entering U.S. ports after Jan. 31. "This ban is consistent with international efforts to further isolate the Noriega regime, which is currently shunned by the democratic nations of Latin America and around the world," the White House said in a statement.

A U.S. Coast Guard cutter blasted away at a suspected drug-smuggling ship with 130 rounds of cannon fire and 600 rounds of machine-gun fire for more than two hours Wednesday, but the Panamanian freighter with a Cuban crew managed to continue on course and escape into Mexican waters. The prolonged assault, the most extensive on a foreign vessel in the U.S.

The U.S. ban on Panamanian-registered ships in U.S. ports has set off what one shipping specialist calls "a feeding frenzy" in flag-of-convenience countries such as this small island nation that are anxious to pick up the registrations that Panama loses. "Everybody's pushing, and their tactics are very aggressive," said Lawrence I. Brown, a Greenwich, Conn., attorney who specializes in ship registrations for Liberia and the tiny Pacific island nation of Vanuatu.

The Panama Canal has served east-west shipping through the Americas for more than 80 years, but now a growing list of other countries from the region want in on the act. Four countries--Mexico, Colombia, Honduras and Nicaragua--all say they have plans to compete alongside the historic Panama Canal, each jockeying to be first or risk losing out on the potentially lucrative sweepstakes.

Two Cubans fleeing their island's economic troubles jumped ship at the Panama Canal on Tuesday and were granted temporary refugee status by the Panamanian government, authorities said. The men were on a boat taking sugar from Cuba to North Korea. "They said they wanted to escape the economic crisis in Cuba," said Jose Javier Mulino, director of the government's organization for the care of refugees.

With the permission of the Panamanian government in exile, federal agents stopped a ship from Panama City and confiscated 3,359 pounds of cocaine, one of the largest seizures in U.S. history, authorities said Friday. Adm. Paul A. Yost, Coast Guard commandant, flew here from Washington for a news conference on the seizure, which he called special because the street value of the confiscated cocaine could have reached nearly $1 billion.

The Panama Canal has served east-west shipping through the Americas for more than 80 years, but now a growing list of other countries from the region want in on the act. Four countries--Mexico, Colombia, Honduras and Nicaragua--all say they have plans to compete alongside the historic Panama Canal, each jockeying to be first or risk losing out on the potentially lucrative sweepstakes.

Two Cubans fleeing their island's economic troubles jumped ship at the Panama Canal on Tuesday and were granted temporary refugee status by the Panamanian government, authorities said. The men were on a boat taking sugar from Cuba to North Korea. "They said they wanted to escape the economic crisis in Cuba," said Jose Javier Mulino, director of the government's organization for the care of refugees.

Two members of a longtime Point Loma tuna fishing family were killed along with two others Thursday night when a U.S. tuna boat exploded, caught fire, and sank in the Panama Canal zone. The news stunned the friends and family of Richard Balelo, 51, and Lionel Correia, 37, both of San Diego, whose bodies were found in the port of Balboa along with a Panamanian night watchman and a Korean crew member.

No drugs were found aboard the H. V. Hermann, a Cuban-chartered freighter that was attacked by the U.S. Coast Guard after refusing to submit to a search in international waters, the Mexican navy said Thursday. "Nothing has been found after a round-the-clock inspection that began at 8:40 Wednesday morning, when the Hermann was received by Mexican naval vessels," a navy spokesman said. The Panamanian-registered freighter was struck by cannon and machine-gun rounds fired by the U.S.

A U.S. Coast Guard cutter blasted away at a suspected drug-smuggling ship with 130 rounds of cannon fire and 600 rounds of machine-gun fire for more than two hours Wednesday, but the Panamanian freighter with a Cuban crew managed to continue on course and escape into Mexican waters. The prolonged assault, the most extensive on a foreign vessel in the U.S.

American companies in Panama shut their offices Wednesday and checked on employees' safety, as the U.S. military's attack sent the Central American nation's deeply troubled economy into chaos. With sporadic fighting continuing, Panama's main airport remained shut to commercial traffic, and the Panama Canal was closed for most of the day, its first combat-related closure in 75 years. A spot check of U.S.

An Iranian gunboat attacked an American-owned tanker with rocket-propelled grenades today, but a nearby U.S. frigate was powerless to take any action. It could only escort the ship, the 103,584-ton Grand Wisdom, after it was hit because the tanker, fully loaded with oil, flies the Panamanian flag. The U.S. Navy can protect only ships flying the Stars and Stripes. Eleven Kuwaiti tankers have been re-registered as American in order to gain U.S. naval protection.

Twenty tons of cocaine seized off the Pacific coast of Panama over the weekend were believed headed to a Mexican port for delivery to the notorious Sinaloa cartel, U.S. officials said Tuesday. The seizure Sunday of drugs valued at more than $275 million wholesale was described by the officials as the largest recorded maritime cocaine bust. The drugs were believed to have been purchased by Ismael Zambada, a suspected leader of Mexico's so-called Sinaloa cartel, officials said.

The U.S. ban on Panamanian-registered ships in U.S. ports has set off what one shipping specialist calls "a feeding frenzy" in flag-of-convenience countries such as this small island nation that are anxious to pick up the registrations that Panama loses. "Everybody's pushing, and their tactics are very aggressive," said Lawrence I. Brown, a Greenwich, Conn., attorney who specializes in ship registrations for Liberia and the tiny Pacific island nation of Vanuatu.

President Bush, trying to tighten the economic screws on Panama's Gen. Manuel A. Noriega "and his puppet regime," Thursday banned Panamanian-flag vessels from entering U.S. ports after Jan. 31. "This ban is consistent with international efforts to further isolate the Noriega regime, which is currently shunned by the democratic nations of Latin America and around the world," the White House said in a statement.