China, US to resume trade talks
August 16, 2018
The Chinese government announced Thursday that a delegation led by Vice Commerce Minister Wang Shouwen would meet with US representatives led by David Malpass later this month.
The world's two largest economies have implemented several rounds of tit-for-tat tariffs on each other's goods since the start of the year and have threatened further duties on imported goods worth hundreds of billions of dollars.
The announcement of the forthcoming meeting came after a lull in talks between the two sides. The last official round of negotiations took place in early June.
It remained unclear whether the gathering would take place before or after August 23 when Washington is due to slap additional tariffs on $16 billion (€14 billion) of Chinese goods.
No winners
As China announced its willingness to resume talks, the Communist Party's newspaper People's Daily once again argued that US companies and consumers would be hit hard by the trade conflict.
It said US President Donald Trump's "America First" policy had caused economic trouble for the country, pointing to examples like losses incurred by US soybean farmers.
"The voices of producers, the international community and expert groups have been pouring forth, but the US administration is turning a deaf ear to them," the newspaper said in a commentary.
The news of the upcoming talks helped Chinese stocks reduce losses in Shanghai and Hong Kong in early trading on Thursday.
hg/jd (Reuters, AFP)