The China-US trade war bubbled away this week, even as the Strait of Hormuz shutdown dominated global headlines. The US is finalising a multinational agreement on trade and critical minerals to break China’s grip on vital resources, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer told lawmakers on Thursday. He also sought a higher budget to support more trade investigations, and suggested potential action to pare US farmers’ reliance on Chinese orders. “We’re not just going to lay down and let the...
In a defiant display of “America first” brinkmanship, Washington’s top trade negotiator on Thursday sought additional funding to support US President Donald Trump’s new trade wars, insisting the administration will not be held hostage by Beijing’s retaliatory tactics ahead of a high-stakes leaders’ summit next month. With Trump set to meet Chinese leader Xi Jinping on May 14-15, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer used the agency’s budget hearing to draw a hard line: the US is doubling down...
A leading European business association in China has urged Brussels to avoid becoming a “passive recipient” of US-China trade negotiations, as European firms scramble to navigate Beijing’s export controls. In a report released on Tuesday, the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China asserted that the EU must take the lead in discussions affecting its interests, while urging Beijing to avoid a one-size-fits-all approach to export controls. “We’re in a situation where Europe simply cannot...
US President Donald Trump said he plans to impose a 20 per cent tariff on all cars imported from the European Union unless the trade bloc “soon” removes import duties and other barriers to US goods, escalating global trade tensions. “Based on the Tariffs and Trade Barriers long placed on the US and it great companies and workers by the European Union, if these Tariffs and Barriers are not soon broken down and removed, we will be placing a 20% Tariff on all of their cars coming into the U.S....
As China and the United States wrapped up their sixth and most recent round of trade talks in Paris this March, a minor mishap briefly stole the spotlight. A sudden gust of wind toppled two American flags in the background, where journalists were waiting for US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Officials rushed to tape them to the wall – a fitting tableau for a trade war that, one year on, is patched together by a truce yet remains far from resolved. At their respective press appearances,...