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China moves to head off trade dispute with the US
15.09.09
China moved today to try to avoid a major trade war with the United States after President Obama introduced higher tariffs on imports of Chinese-made tyres.
"US and Chinese trade and economic relations are the most important bilateral relations. We don't want to see anything bad happen to bilateral relations," said Chinese Commerce Ministry spokesman, Yao Jian.
He said that China would press ahead with its complaint to the World Trade Organisation over the tyre tariffs. Analysts said that showed that the Chinese were keen to go through official channels and did not want the dispute to escalate to other areas of trade ahead of the G20 meeting next week. President Obama is due to meet Chinese president Hu Jintao at the Pittsburgh summit.
"The source of the financial crisis was in the United States. So the US, as a developed country, should use protectionist measures less, or use them cautiously," Yao said.
However, he added later: "We have consensus in a lot of trade and economic fields. We will negotiate the conflicts under this general framework."
