The Trump administration said trade talks with China are starting up again as Beijing reiterated that it\u2019s essential the U.S. removes all existing tariffs for a deal to be reached.<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed last month to re-start trade talks and suspend new tariffs, but they gave no time-frame for further negotiations or a deadline to strike an agreement.<\/p>\n
While Trump said he would hold off imposing additional tariffs on $300 billion of Chinese goods as part of the truce, his top trade negotiators have insisted that some duties will stay in place even after a deal as a way to enforce it.<\/p>\n
White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said Friday that US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin have been speaking with China\u2019s top trade negotiator, Liu He by phone and that more talks are planned. He didn\u2019t elaborate on the substance.<\/p>\n
A face-to-face meeting is also \u201cin the cards\u201d and will happen \u201cat some point in the near future,\u201d Kudlow, director of the National Economic Council, said on Bloomberg TV on Friday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no timeline, the issue is if you want quality, we do not have to have speed.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018Imposed Tariffs,\u2019 Huawei<\/strong><\/p>\n Negotiations between the world\u2019s two largest economies collapsed in May after US officials accused China of backtracking on draft commitments, and amid key sticking points like China\u2019s demand that the US lift all the punitive tariffs put in place since the trade war started almost a year ago.<\/p>\n On Friday, an influential blog connected to Chinese state media said the talks will \u201cgo backward again\u201d without the removal of US tariffs, echoing the line from the Ministry of Commerce\u2019s weekly briefing on Thursday.<\/p>\n \u201cIf the two sides are to reach a deal, all imposed tariffs must be removed,\u201d Ministry of Commerce Spokesman Gao Feng said Thursday. \u201cChina\u2019s attitude on that is clear and consistent.\u201d<\/p>\n Scrapping all the punitive tariffs the US imposed is the \u201cmost important\u201d request and that won\u2019t change during the trade talks, according to a commentary by Taoran Notes, a blog run by the Economic Daily under a pseudonym on the WeChat platform.<\/p>\n Separately, Kudlow says it\u2019s likely that Huawei Technologies Co. will “remain on the entity list” although the Commerce Department may expand licensing for American companies to complete transactions with the Chinese telecommunications firm.<\/p>\n \u201cWe will not open licenses for any national security areas, be they chips or whatever,\u201d Kudlow said.<\/p>\n Following his summit with Xi, Trump said he would ease a ban on Huawei by allowing US supplies to sell the company components if they don\u2019t pose a national security concern.<\/p>\n
\n