China denounces US's tariffs, says they are open for talks

Beijing [China], February 2 (ANI): China has strongly denounced US President Donald Trump's decision of imposing tariffs, while also leaving the door open for talks to avoid a deepening conflict, Al Jazeera reported on Sunday.

Beijing's Commerce and Finance ministries said China will challenge the decision before the World Trade Organization and take unspecified "countermeasures". The Ministry of Commerce said the tariff "seriously violates" international trade rules, urging the US to "engage in frank dialogue and strengthen cooperation".

But their response stopped short of the immediate escalation that had marked China's trade showdown with Trump in his first term as President.

China's sharpest pushback on Sunday was over fentanyl, which Beijing has been urging the US to crack down.

"Fentanyl is America's problem," the Chinese Ministry of Finance said. "The Chinese side has carried out extensive anti-narcotics cooperation with the United States and achieved remarkable results," as per Al Jazeera.

Meanwhile, Zhiwei Zhang, an expert on the Chinese economy, said Trump's action was "not a big shock to China's economy", adding that it was "unlikely to change the market expectation on China's macro outlook".

The extraordinary threat posed by illegal aliens and drugs, including deadly fentanyl, constitutes a national emergency under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), a statement from White House said on Saturday (local time).

Trump's statement said that until the 'crisis' was reduced, the US imposed 10 per cent additional tariff on imports from China.

Trump said that he is taking the 'bold' action to hold China accountable to their promises of halting illegal immigration and stopping poisonous fentanyl and other drugs from flowing into the country, as per White House.

"In response to China's intellectual property theft, forced technology transfer, and other unreasonable behavior, President Trump acted with conviction to impose tariffs on imports from China, using that leverage to reach a historic bilateral economic agreement," the statement said.

During his first term as President of the United States, Trump established the President's Commission on Combating Drug Addiction and the Opioid Crisis and declared the Opioid Crisis a public health emergency, as per the statement. (ANI)

(The story has come from a syndicated feed and has not been edited by the Tribune Staff.)