The president, Donald Trump, said today that the tariffs imposed on China will remain in force for a “substantial period of time” until it is guaranteed that Beijing complies with the trade agreement, currently under negotiation between both parties.
“We are not talking about withdrawing them (tariffs), we are talking about leaving them for a substantial period of time because we have to make sure that if we reach an agreement with China, China will comply,” Trump told reporters at the White House before to travel to the state of Ohio.
“They have had many problems fulfilling certain agreements,” he added.
At the end of February, Trump announced a delay in the hike in tariffs scheduled on March 1 to hundreds of Chinese imports in the face of the “advances” reached during the last round of trade negotiations held in Washington.
The term marked by the president himself was to increase the levies imposed on Chinese products valued at $ 200,000 million from 10% to 25%.
Despite these advances, Trump stressed that any final agreement should be endorsed in a meeting with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, something that was expected to happen during this month of March but has been postponed to a new date, given the complexity of the negotiations .
Washington has demanded that the pact include a review mechanism that guarantees compliance with the agreed conditions.
Next week will travel to Beijing again a US delegation, headed by Robert Lighthizer, Foreign Trade representative, who will be accompanied by Secretary of the Treasury, Steven Mnuchin.
The country registers with China a notable trade deficit, something that Trump blames on the, in his opinion, “unfair” practices of the Asian giant: exported to China in 2017 products worth 130,000 million dollars, while sales of the Asian giant to the national market amounted to 506,000 million dollars
The trade war between the two largest world economies, unleashed by the president’s aggressive protectionism, has generated uneasiness and volatility in international financial markets. (EFEUSA)
