In an informative session of the media after a second day of conversations with American negotiators on Sunday, the Vice Primer Chinese Minister, Lifeng, said that commercial conversations with the United States “achieved substantial progress and reached an important consensus.”
On early Sunday, the White House said he reached an agreement without providing any detail.
While the United States commercial representative, Jamieson Greer, described him as an “agreement”, the secretary of the Treasury, Scott Besent, who was in Switzerland for conversations with Greer, said only that a “substantial progress” had been made.
President Donald Trump expressed on Friday the will to relieve tariffs in China, saying that in social networks “it seems correct” to reduce taxes from 145% to 80%.
The United States Secretary of the United States, Scott Besent and the United States trade representative, Jamieson Greer, spoke with the media after the tariff conversations between senior officials of the United States and China in the residence of the Swiss Swiss Ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva on May 11, 2025.
Valentin Flauraud/AFP through Getty Images
Trump last month sharply increased tariffs on China, which led China to retaliate with 125% tariffs on US assets. Tit -for-Tat measures triggered a commercial war with the third business partner of the United States, which represented almost $ 440 billion in imports last year.
Tariffs caused warnings of a series of companies about the risk of price increases for American buyers.
China said it will issue a joint statement with the US. UU. On Monday with respect to the agreement reached on Sunday.
“The two parties agreed to establish a consultation mechanism for commercial and economic problems, identify the leaders on each side and will continue with more consultations related to the commercial and economic issues of their respective concerns,” said the Vice Prime Chinese Minister.
He said that China’s position has been “clear and consistent”, and that he does not want a commercial war.
“China does not want to fight a commercial war because trade wars do not produce winners. But if the United States insists on forcing this war against the United States, China will not be afraid of that, and we will fight until the end,” he said.
Chinese officials called the “productive” meeting and said that “an important first step [was] Taken by the two parts to properly solve their differences through the dialogue of equal foot. “
When a journalist asked him if the possible agreement would help the White House to address the commercial deficit of the United States, China postponed to the Joint Declaration on Monday.
“China is always looking for winning results in its commercial and economic negotiations, therefore, any possible agreement to achieve will definitely be China’s development interest. [inaud]”Said the commercial negotiator Li Chenggang.
When asked about the atmosphere of the meetings, the Chinese commercial negotiator Li Chenggang characterized them by having “mutual respect” and “sincerity.”
-ABC News’ Max Zahn contributed to this report.
