Washington (AFP) – US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent slammed Beijing in an interview this week, accusing it of seeking to harm the global economy after China slapped sweeping new export controls in the strategic field of rare earths.
“This is a sign of how weak their economy is, and they want to pull everybody else down with them,” Bessent told the Financial Times in an interview on Monday. His comments came days after Beijing imposed fresh controls on the export of rare earth technologies and items. China is the world’s leading producer of the minerals used to make magnets crucial to the auto, electronic, and defense industries.
The US Treasury chief claimed China’s controls signaled problems in its own economy: “They are in the middle of a recession/depression, and they are trying to export their way out of it.” China’s announcement last week sparked a fiery response from US President Donald Trump, who on Friday said he would roll out an additional 100-percent tariff on the country’s goods from November 1. Trump also threatened to scrap a planned meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit starting later this month.
Trade tensions between Washington and Beijing have reignited in Trump’s second presidency, with tit-for-tat duties reaching triple-digit levels at one point. For now, both countries have de-escalated tensions, but the truce remains shaky. China on Sunday accused the United States of “double standards” after Trump’s threat of further tariffs. The US leader later insisted that he wanted to “help China, not hurt it.”
On Tuesday, China said it was ready to “fight to the end” in a trade war with the United States, shortly before a new wave of US tariffs on wood products took effect. A senior US official told the FT that China International Trade Representative Li Chenggang had previewed many of China’s current lines of attack that recently played out. The official said Li was aggressive in stating that the United States would face “hellfire” if things did not go his way.
© 2024 AFP
