Juan Demóstenes Arosemena Barreati

Juan Demóstenes Arosemena Barreati (born June 24, 1879 in Panama City , † December 16, 1939 in Penonomé , Coclé province ) was the 17th President of Panama and was the brother of the former President Florencio Harmodio Arosemena .

Arosemena Barreati was first governor of the province of Colón and then Foreign Minister of Panama for seven years and in this position also led the delegation to the Pan-American Conference in Montevideo in 1933 . In 1936 he was put up as a presidential candidate for the coalition between the national-liberal and conservative parties. After winning the elections, he took office as President of the Republic on October 1, 1936, succeeding Harmodio Arias Madrid and remained in office until his death in 1939. He was succeeded by Ezequiel Fernández Jaén .

In Panama he enjoyed a high reputation, especially because in negotiations from 1936 to 1939 he succeeded in negotiating a new treaty for the Treaty on the Panama Canal concluded with the USA in 1903 , which was ratified by America in the year of his death, after which the USA did not Were allowed to send more troops to Panama without obtaining permission from the Panamanian government. Shortly before his death, he sent a diplomatic note to the nations of Great Britain , France and Germany , in which he declared Panama and the associated sea area to be neutral when the Second World War broke out .