Cui Tiankai, the Chinese Ambassador to the United States, said that Beijing will “fight back” against the latest tariffs from the White House with “maybe with the same intensity, the same scale,”
“We will certainly respond accordingly,” ambassador Cui Tiankai told Seema Mody in an exclusive CNBC interview. “We will resort to the WTO — World Trade Organization — dispute settlement mechanism, and we’ll, in accordance with Chinese laws, take measures to fight back.”
He said that the announcement of more tariffs by the U.S. on China is “another step in the wrong direction.”
The United States unveiled a list of around 1,300 Chinese products it plans to impose with a 25% tariff as part of a crackdown on what the Trump administration considers unfair trading practices. The announcement comes after China slapped $3 billion worth of US products with tariffs in response to tariffs the US imposed on Chinese steel and aluminium.
Beijing said it “strongly condemns and firmly opposes” the new tariffs.
“Such unilateralistic and protectionist action has gravely violated fundamental principles and values of the WTO [World Trade Organisation],” the Chinese embassy in Washington said in a statement on Wednesday.
China said that the US decision to impose more tariffs is not in the country’s best interests and “even less the interest of the global economy”.
“As the Chinese saying goes, it is only polite to reciprocate,” the statement added. “The Chinese side will resort to the WTO dispute settlement mechanism and take corresponding measures of equal scale and strength against US products in accordance with Chinese law.”