The administrator of the Panama Canal said Friday that the vital waterway will remain in Panamanian hands and open to commerce from all countries, rejecting claims by President-elect Donald Trump that the United States should take it over.

Treaties ratified by the Senate in 1978 established permanent neutrality, but some Republicans regret that decision.

Donald Trump has refused to rule out using military force to retake the Panama Canal that was returned by the US to Panama decades ago.

The canal was turned over to Panama on Dec. 31, 1999. For Carter, the deal signified a new beginning of mutual respect and cooperation between the U.S. and Latin America, as he said in his speech in 1978. It also showed “the last remnant of alleged American colonialism is being removed” during a time when the world moved away from imperialism.

President-elect Donald J. Trump refused on Tuesday to rule out the use of military or economic coercion to force Panama to give up control of the canal that America built more than a century ago and to push Denmark to sell Greenland to the United States.

Panama is celebrating the 25th anniversary of the U.S. handover of the Panama Canal, which President-elect Donald Trump has threatened to take back