So I was reading all this and the only think in my mind was.... can I bring my hardware. heh... guess not.
Panama, only legal residents may own and/or carry guns, as opposed to visitors and tourists. Therefore a foreigner can apply for gun ownership once he or she has satisfied immigration requirements and obtained legal residence. Since Panama has neither an army nor the equivalent of the N.R.A., gun ownership rules differ sensibly from U.S. regulations. To begin with there are no gun fairs... you can only purchase a gun from a handful of authorized dealers, and the choices are very limited - not to mention prices are about double what you would expect to pay. Unless you prefer to place a special order, which is going to delay the process by a number of months, you can purchase a gun under five minutes, the time it takes to process your credit card. This is however where the similarity ends... The gun(s) shall remain in the store's custody until you secure a permit - which in practice can easily take six to nine months. And this is where the fun begins: you'll have to provide a urine sample on the spot (to check for drug use) and later blood samples (to keep your DNA on file) not to mention fingerprints. Also you'll need to visit a psychiatrist to undergo a psychological evaluation. In the meantime, the store will ship the gun to the police, which will perform ballistic tests and keep all records on file, together with your full ID and address. The permit is valid for 5 years and must be showed prior to purchasing ammunition.
That and what countries don’t have extradition with the US.