Home Pan Africa US and China Sign Agreement on Trade: Treaty with India Soon -Trump

US and China Sign Agreement on Trade: Treaty with India Soon -Trump

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Export controls of the minerals eclipsed tariffs in the latest round of trade negotiations between Beijing and Washington after China imposed permitting requirements on seven rare earth elements in April, threatening to disrupt production of cars, robots, wind turbines, and other high-tech products in the US and around the world.

(4 Minutes Read)

Export controls of the minerals eclipsed tariffs in the latest round of trade negotiations between Beijing and Washington after China imposed permitting requirements on seven rare earth elements in April, threatening to disrupt production of cars, robots, wind turbines, and other high-tech products in the US and around the world.

The US and China have signed an agreement on trade, President Donald Trump said, adding he expects to have a deal with India soon. It is reported that the deal was signed earlier this week. However, the US Administration did not provide any details about the agreement.

It was unclear if the latest agreement is different from the one Trump announced two weeks earlier, when he said it would make it easier for American industries to obtain much-needed magnets and rare earth minerals. That pact cleared the way for the trade talks to continue, while the US agreed to stop trying to revoke visas of Chinese nationals on US college campuses.

China’s Commerce Ministry said Friday that the two sides had further confirmed the details of the framework. But its statement did not explicitly mention US access to rare earths, minerals used in high-tech applications that have been at the center of the negotiations.

The statement stated that China will approve the export applications of controlled items that meet the conditions per the law. The United States will cancel a series of restrictive measures taken against China accordingly. It is hoped that the United States and China will meet each other halfway.

The agreement follows initial talks in Geneva in early May that led both sides to postpone massive tariff hikes that were threatening to freeze much trade between the two countries. Later talks in London set a framework for negotiations, and the deal mentioned by Trump appeared to formalise that agreement.

China has not announced any new agreements, but it said earlier this week that it was speeding up approvals of exports of rare earths, materials used in high-tech products such as electric vehicles. Beijing’s limits on exports of rare earths have been a key point of contention.

The Chinese Commerce Ministry said Thursday that Beijing was accelerating the review of export license applications for rare earths and had approved “a certain number of compliant applications.”

Export controls of the minerals eclipsed tariffs in the latest round of trade negotiations between Beijing and Washington after China imposed permitting requirements on seven rare earth elements in April, threatening to disrupt production of cars, robots, wind turbines, and other high-tech products in the US and around the world. China also has taken steps recently on the fentanyl issue, announcing last week that it would designate two more substances as precursor chemicals for fentanyl.

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https://trendsnafrica.com/trump-declares-us-china-trade-deal-done-secures-access-to-rare-earth-minerals-and-magnets/

On April 1, 2019, China announced that all variants of fentanyl would be treated as controlled substances, after Washington urged Beijing to stop fuelling the opioid epidemic in the United States. China criminalises the production and exportation of Fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, which reminded people of trade wars that happened 170 years ago in China.