Customs Taxes: Beijing urges the US to “curb their protectionist measures”

AFP

Friday, 2 march 2018, 04:27

UPDATE
Friday, 2 march 2018, 04:27

Look at this article

BEIJING, China | Beijing urged Friday the United States to “curb” their use of protectionist measures and “respect the rules” of international trade, after the announcement by president Donald Trump of heavy taxes on american imports of aluminum and steel.

“China requests the United States to curb their use of protectionist measures and abide by multilateral trade rules,” said Hua Chunying, a spokesperson for the ministry of foreign Affairs.

“If other countries will dovetail with each other, this would have a serious impact on the order of international trade”, she added at a regular press conference, recalling that “the foundations of the global economic recovery is still unstable”.

In addition, the United States already provide “excessive protection” to their local producers of steel and aluminum, after having adopted “more than a hundred counter-measures” targeting the us imports in these sectors, has tancé Ms. Hua.

However, it did not mention possible reprisals or counter-measures from Beijing.

Donald Trump said Thursday he would announce next week the imposition of customs duties of 25 % steel and 10 % aluminum imported by the United States.

This announcement comes as Liu He, the very close economic adviser to the chinese president Xi Jinping is visiting Washington to try to smooth out the sharp trade disputes between the two powers.

Mr. Liu met with u.s. secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin, with the us Trade representative Robert Lighthizer, as well as with the economic advisor to the president Trump, Gary Cohn, said Hua Chunying.

“They already had frank exchange of views, establishing the conditions necessary for the next step of deepening our cooperation”, added the spokesperson.

The statements of Mr. Trump arouse the fears of the war customs with the China’s second largest trading partner of the United States and particularly targeted by Washington.

Beijing has already warned repeatedly that he would not stay arms folded in the face of the protectionist attitude of american and adopt “the necessary measures” to defend the interests of its exporters.

However, if China produces about half the world’s steel, it provides less than 2 % of the steel imported by the United States.

Similarly, steel and aluminum are a very small portion of the total exports of the asian giant to the United States.

Brussels and Washington fustigent, however, happy that the enormous overcapacity of steel mills in china, including the overproduction endemic has contributed to depressing world prices.