Colombia’s government has applied to join a China-based development bank. The bank was set up a decade ago as a project of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa as a means to U.S.-dominated institutions like the World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank. So far, the New Development Bank has approved loans for 122 infrastructure projects totaling more than $40 billion in areas such as transport, sanitation and clean energy, according to Rousseff.

Colombia’s leader Gustavo Petro said that he was especially excited by the possibility of securing the New Development Bank’s support for a 120-kilometer (75-mile) canal, or railway, connecting Colombia’s Atlantic and Pacific Ocean coastlines that he said would position the country at the “heart” of trade between South America and Asia.

Colombia is the second Latin American country to try and join the bank after tiny Uruguay sought membership in 2021.

Petro, a former leftist guerrilla, said he wouldn’t be dissuaded by U.S. pressure and reaffirmed that Colombia seeks to remain neutral in a new era of geopolitical wrangling.

“We made this decision freely,” Petro told reporters from Shanghai. “With the United States we can speak face to face, with China too.”