(Newswire.net— July 6, 2018) — Trump’s administration started the greatest trade war in history and China has no choice but to fight back, China’s commerce ministry stated.
“On July 6, the US began to impose 25 percent tariffs on $34 billion worth of Chinese imports. The US has breached WTO trade rules and launched the largest trade war in economic history to date,” the ministry’s statement read.
The new 25 percent taxes which apply to 818 Chinese imports worth $34 billion are only the first step in taxing $450 billion worth of Chinese trade goods, the Russia Today reports.
China promised not to “fire the first shot” but as Washington starts implementing new tariffs the proposed retaliation in 35% tariffs to goods coming from the US may soon become active. Since there are more goods imported from China to the US than vice versa, the trade war is going to hit the Chinese economy significantly harder. However, Beijing warned that with this move the US will “shoot itself in the foot and hurt the world.”
This may be true, economy experts agree, saying that a trade war is not just about how much a country’s economy is hit but how fast it can recover and sustain further pressure. According to all parameters, the US economy is much more fragile compared to their Chinese counterpart.
The European Union economy is highly dependable on China, however, politically even more dependable on the United States. As the EU’s economy is going to struggle in the wake of Washington’s Trade War against China, Beijing offered the EU economy an alliance against the US. Brussels has so far rejected the offer.
According to EU officials, Chinese state media has promoted the message that the European Union is on China’s side, putting the block in a delicate position, Russia Today reports. The news agency quoted Chinese Xinhua news agency which reported on a possible alliance between EU and China.
“China and European countries are natural partners,” Xinhua said. “They firmly believe that free trade is a powerful engine for global economic growth.”
The proposal came amid tensions between US and EU over Trump’s threats of imposing the trade war to the EU as well. Washington won the economic battle for Europe as Brussels rejected the idea of partnering up with China on the trade issue. “China wants the European Union to stand with Beijing against Washington, to take sides,” adding, “We won’t do it and we have told them that,” RT cited an EU diplomat. How strong are the ties between the US and the EU is shown in the recent decision of the EU parliament to extend sanctions on Russia over Ukraine, which already cost the EU economy greatly.