CHINA – China will not be content to only play defence in an escalating trade war with the United States, a widely read Chinese tabloid warned.
Beijing may also decline to participate in proposed trade talks with Washington later this month if the Trump administration goes ahead with the additional tariffs, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday, as citied by Chinese officials.
The United States and China have already levied duties on $50 billion worth of each other’s goods in an intensifying battle that has jolted global financial markets in the past few months.
Last week, the world’s two biggest economies appeared to be making progress on the trade after the U.S. Treasury Department invited senior Chinese officials including Vice Premier Liu He for more talks. A senior administration official told Reuters over the weekend that Trump is likely to announce the new tariffs as early as Monday.
Besides retaliating with tariffs, China could also restrict export of goods, raw materials and components core to U.S. manufacturing supply chains, former finance minister Lou Jiwei told a Beijing forum on Sunday, according to an attendee. Lou is the chairman of the National Council for Social Security Fund.
Trump has demanded that China cut its $375 billion trade surplus with the United States, end policies aimed at acquiring U.S. technologies and intellectual property and roll back high-tech industrial subsidies.
