Papadimitriu And Shamah Tilt Against The Former US Ambassador to Panama
(Panama-Guide) - La Prensa - In response to the scandal created thanks to the revealing comments made by the former US Ambassador to Panama, Barbara Stephenson, senior members of the Ricardo Martinelli administration defended the actions of the president this morning and criticized the positions taken by the US official. Stephenson harshly questioned Martinelli's actions and said he asked for help from the United States to tap into cellular telephone conversations, according to an official and classified State Department cable released by the website Wikileaks, which was published last weekend in international media.
In response to these comments, the administrator of Panama's Tourism Authority (PTA), Solomon Shamah, said today that Stephenson said this because "she got pissed off" at Ricardo Martinelli, because she was not allowed to impose the criteria of the United States on Panama. Shamah said on the Channel 2 TVN Noticias morning news broadcast that the "derogatory" and "disrespectful" manner in which the former ambassador spoke to the President shows that there was animosity against him. "The ambassador wanted to impose her views and the President stood firm," said Shamah, who said that Stephenson did not agree with the appointment of Gustavo Perez as the Chief of the National Police, but Martinelli said that was an executive decision. Because "this kind of thing had never happened to her before," which is why she "got pissed off at the President," said Shamah. There are 900 cables about Panama - Panama's Minister of the Presidency Jimmy Papadimitriu spoke along these same lines when he discussed the issue. He not only criticized Stephenson's comments but he also noted that the government will not answer them. Papadimitriu said on the Channel 13 Telemetro Reporta morning news broadcast that Wikileaks has more than 250,000 cables from the US State Department, of which 900 relate to Panama. Of those, 100 have to do with the administration of Ricardo Martinelli, and 800 have to do with past administrations of the Democratic Revolutionary Party, said the minister. He added that the publication of these leaked cables could take from one to two years, and he said the government of Panama would not respond to any of them.
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Original Source: Panama-Guide
Date Retrieved: December 27, 2010.
