President-elect Trump again took on the matter of the Panama Canal, suggesting to a conference of his supporters that it be returned to U.S. control in a remarkable suggestion to push a sovereign country to cede territory.

President-elect Donald Trump over the weekend suggested the US should retake the Panama Canal, an idea that was immediately rejected by the government of Panama, which has controlled the passage for decades.

The U.S. helped engineer Panama's independence from Colombia to build the canal, which opened in 1914. But it ceded control to Panama in 1999.