In November 2024, the relationship between Peru and the People’s Republic of China (PRC) took a decisive turn with the inauguration of the Chancay Multipurpose Port Terminal. This ambitious project, majority owned by the Chinese state-owned Cosco Ocean Shipping Company (COSCO), was presented as a transformational milestone for the Peruvian economy and its regional integration. Months prior to its inauguration, however, controversy arose: Peru, under pressure from Beijing, granted COSCO exclusive rights to operate the port for the next 30 years. “It is clear that China never thought of building a port for Peru, but rather a Chinese port in Peruvian territory,” Agustín Barletti, Argentine journalist and expert in ports and maritime transport, told Diálogo.
Experts and analysts have described this as the most forceful example of the PRC’s expansion scheme to control strategic sectors in Latin America and consolidate its global influence. According to Leland Lazarus, associate director of National Security at the Jack D. Gordon Institute for Public Policy at Florida International University, the port is a key piece in the PRC’s plan to monopolize the global supply chains of strategic minerals such as copper. Currently, the Asian country controls 70 percent of Peru’s exports of this essential mineral for its technology industry, which ranges from electric vehicle manufacturing to data center development. In return, Lazarus said, “Chinese companies will flood the region with low-cost green technologies, such as electric vehicles, lithium batteries, and solar panels, displacing local and foreign competitors and further strengthening their position in the regional market.”
But concerns go beyond increased trade.
In September 2024, The Wall Street Journal revealed in an investigation that cranes manufactured by Chinese state-owned company ZPMC, used in various ports worldwide, include remote access modems that could allow Beijing to monitor and control port operations remotely, exposing user countries to risk of espionage and possible operational disruptions. These cranes are already in use at the Port of Chancay. “Through the construction of the port, China is also financing its own industry, because it only allows Peru to acquire cranes from Chinese firm ZPMC,” Barletti said.
To this alarming situation is added China’s growing dominance in critical sectors in Peru, such as energy. Currently, 100 percent of the electricity distribution in Lima, the country’s capital, is under the control of Chinese state-owned companies, which are also advancing in the acquisition of strategic hydroelectric plants in the Andean territory. The progressive penetration of the PRC in key areas such as energy, mining, and transportation would place Peru in a vulnerable geopolitical position, with profound implications for its sovereignty and economy, as analyzed in the first two parts of this special report.
The question that remains to be answered is: How did the PRC manage to consolidate such a significant influence in Peru?
According to journalist and former Spanish media correspondent in the PRC Juan Pablo Cardenal, part of the answer lies in the economic opening and the broad flexibilities granted to foreign markets, opportunities that Chinese companies, backed by the State, knew how to take full advantage of. Another key is the notable lack of resistance Beijing has encountered in the Andean country. “There is an unspoken consensus in Peruvian society, where no one dares to say no to China. This does not occur in any other country in the region,” Cardenal told Diálogo.
This silence has even permeated the media, where criticism or questioning of China’s presence and investments is conspicuous by its absence, eroding Peru’s capacity to establish clear limits in the face of the PRC’s influence. “It’s as if criticizing China is taboo. Any negative news barely lasts a few days in the public eye before disappearing without a trace,” said Hernan Padilla, investigative journalist and co-author of The Tarot Club, Peru’s largest corruption investigation involving Chinese companies.
China’s shadow over the Peruvian media
Beijing’s “open wallet” policy has allowed the PRC to exert considerable influence in various sectors in Peru, and the media has been no exception. According to Peruvian journalist and analyst Paolo Benza, “The Peruvian media rarely address the possible negative consequences of Chinese intervention, and when they do, the coverage is superficial and moderate.”
Part of this silence can be explained by the PRC’s well-articulated strategy to penetrate the local media and spread favorable propaganda. “There is no critical view of Chinese investments because it is not convenient for the Peruvian media. Many are politically aligned or participate directly in agreements with Chinese companies,” Benza told Diálogo.
A revealing example is the Peruvian state news agency Andina, which, according to research by non-profit organizations such as The Freedom House and think tank Doublethink Lab, has established a partnership with Chinese state news agency Xinhua, frequently using it as a source for content production.
This phenomenon has spread to other information channels. A recent agreement, signed on June 29, 2024, during the official visit of Peru’s President Dina Boluarte to Beijing, shows how far Chinese influence has advanced in the Peruvian media. In this meeting, the National Institute of Radio and Television of Peru (IRTP) and the China Media Group (CMG), which groups state-owned China Central Television, China National Radio, and China Radio International, signed an agreement to strengthen technological cooperation with a focus on innovation and the exchange of media content, including news, reports, and documentaries.
However, Beijing’s influence on Peruvian media is not limited to state-owned channels. La República, one of the country’s most influential private newspapers, also announced an agreement with CMG for joint content production. This agreement, signed in the framework of Peru’s official visit to the PRC in June 2024, was presented as an effort to strengthen the bilateral relationship. However, critics have warned that it represents a disturbing rapprochement with the Chinese Communist Party’s propaganda interests. “It is clear that La República has agreed to become the propaganda arm of the Chinese regime,” Benza said.
Beijing’s media influence goes beyond agreements with local media. In its investigation, Beijing’s Global Media Influence: Authoritarian Expansion and the Power of Democratic Resilience, Freedom House indicated that the Chinese government subsidizes trips for Peruvian journalists to the PRC, where they receive training on Chinese culture and state media. According to this investigation, participants receive explicit guidelines so that, upon their return to Peru, they only publish articles that project a positive image of the Asian country. “China invites journalists on an all-expenses-paid basis and exposes them to party propaganda, offering them scholarships and symposiums. As a result, many come back mesmerized. This has been done with Agencia Andina and TV Peru,”, Cardenal said.
To these concerns is added that of journalist Benza, who denounced that the PRC not only seeks to promote a favorable image, but also to silence criticism of its actions.
This soft power does not stop at wooing journalists but extends to a more coercive approach. As Freedom House pointed out, Beijing uses extortion and threat to impose its agenda on the world’s media, including, of course, Peru. An emblematic case is the censorship of books by Peruvian Nobel Prize winner Mario Vargas Llosa in the PRC. Vargas Llosa’s works were removed from Chinese bookstores and digital platforms after the author criticized the Chinese political system and its handling of the pandemic in one of his newspaper columns, Spanish daily El País reported.
This combination of tactics — from agreements with local media to disinformation campaigns — has created an environment of self-censorship in Peru. According to Cardenal, this dynamic is evident in the coverage of the controversial Port of Chancay. After analyzing more than 100 articles published on the project between 2019 and 2022, only five mentioned any kind of risk, and these focused exclusively on social or environmental aspects, leaving aside geopolitical implications. “China has cultivated and maintained a positive image in Peru, while the risks of this influence, economic, social, and political, remain hidden or relegated to the background,” the journalist said.
Corruption: the hidden price of Chinese investment in Peru
In addition to the lack of media coverage of the criticisms or risks associated with China’s presence and investments in Peru, there is an equally worrisome phenomenon: the accusations of corruption surrounding several Chinese companies in the country. These cases have received lesser attention from the Peruvian media.
“Corruption scandals are a constant in the business model of many Chinese companies,” said Cardenal, who added that this dynamic is deeply linked to the Chinese regime system. “Being a dictatorship, there is no free press, civil society, nongovernmental organizations, or strong institutions to oversee the actions of their companies, i.e. they lack public scrutiny. This gives them freedom to act without restrictions abroad, indifferent to the social, labor, and environmental side effects of their international expansion, quite the opposite of Western companies, which do face greater reputational and legal risks,” Cardenal said.
One of the most striking cases in Peru is known as the Tarot Club, a corporate espionage scheme involving several Chinese companies that came to light in mid-2022. These companies allegedly contracted a hacking service dubbed Tarot, which violated Peru’s Electronic State Contracting System (Seace), gaining access to confidential information on the proposals of other competitors in public tenders, Hernán Padilla, Peruvian journalist of TV news program Punto Final and one of the authors of this investigation, told Diálogo.
According to Padilla, this information allowed Chinese companies to submit more competitive bids, securing million-dollar contracts. “We are talking about bids obtained through espionage. Chinese companies benefited from a corrupt system to win public tenders in Peru,” Padilla said.
One of the most striking cases is that of the Altiplano Hospital Consortium, made up of Chinese state-owned companies Weihai Construction Group Company Limited and China Railway No. 10 Engineering Group Co. This consortium won the bid to build the Altiplano Hospital in Puno. Their proposal, submitted at the end of the deadline, offered a significantly lower price than the rest, thanks to privileged information obtained through Tarot. “We are talking about a hospital in one of the most vulnerable regions of Peru and with serious health infrastructure deficiencies, whose construction was awarded to Chinese companies that acted illegally to obtain the contract,” Padilla said.
Despite complaints, the consortium kept the tender, and the project has been far from problem free. Since its launch in December 2021, the work has faced multiple difficulties, including delays and a five-month complete stop, attributed in part to the non-payment of workers, according to Eleuterio Coyori, secretary of Civil Construction of Puno.
This is not the only case that has involved these companies. The consortium behind this project was also implicated in the corruption scandal related to the awarding of the Manuel Núñez Butrón Hospital, located in the town of Jayllihuaya. According to reports from the Comptroller General’s Office, the Manuel Núñez Hospital Consortium, made up of the Chinese companies China Railway No. 10 Engineering Group and Weihai Construction Group, submitted false documentation to prove their experience in hospital construction, which allowed them to obtain the contract unlawfully.
Despite allegations of irregularities, many of these Chinese companies continue to operate without restrictions or sanctions in Peru. One example is Weihai Construction, which is still seeking contracts with the Peruvian State, indicated the Andrés Bello Foundation, which specializes in the research and analysis of relations between China and Latin American and Caribbean countries.
Checkmate
Through a scheme that combines strategic investments, trade agreements, and growing control over key sectors, the PRC has established itself as a dominant player in the Peruvian economy. This influence, as Cardenal points out, has been facilitated by the increasingly widespread perception that Beijing offers exclusive opportunities that other trading partners and foreign investors cannot match. In addition, the belief has taken root that its role is essential to the country’s economic development and modernization. “This narrative has gained traction in the country, finding few critical voices questioning its real impact,” Cardenal said.
That real impact, which experts and analysts have warned about and was explained throughout this report, reveals a worrisome imbalance. The benefits of this relationship are heavily tilted toward Beijing, while Peru faces significant risks of economic dependence and geopolitical vulnerability, progressively eroding its national sovereignty. “The Port of Chancay remains as a clear antecedent of how, under the facade of economic progress, geopolitical strategies are hidden that limit Peru’s capacity to make sovereign decisions,” Barletti said.
Given this reality, a crucial question arises: To what extent is China willing to go to increase its influence in Peru and what measures will the Andean country take to protect its strategic interests?
“It is time for Peru to start separating rhetoric from facts, demand accountability from Chinese companies for the social and environmental impacts of their operations, and seriously assess the geopolitical risks involved in the growing Chinese influence on its institutions and strategic projects,” Cardenal said.
Failure to do so, experts warn, could lead the country to find itself at an irreversible disadvantage. On this global game board, China would be saying to Peru: checkmate.
This article is the third installment of a three-part investigation. Read Part I and Part II.
