WTO case against China gathers steam

• Source: Global Times
• [07:59 June 24 2009]
• Comments

“Such cases, even if the US wins, can only be vanity achievements of its trade officials,” Mei predicted.

The US and the EU have “staged such kind of shows” several times before, Mei added.

But US Trade Representative Ron Kirk said in Washington yesterday that “China’s measures appear to be part of a troubling industrial policy aimed at providing substantial competitive advantages for the Chinese industries using these inputs.”

“We are going to the WTO today to enforce our rights, so we can provide American manufacturers with a fair competitive environment and put more American workers back on the job,” Kirk told AFP.

The EU decided in 2000 to exert anti-dumping duties on China’s exported coke, a key raw material for steel makers, when the European steel industry was in a slump. But when the steel-making industry started warming, the EU asked China instead to ease its export restrictions on coke and complained that the unavailability of coke from China had forced European prices upward. The EU Commission decided in 2004 to suspend its anti-dumping tax on coke from China.

“China can’t accept the free demand from other countries,” Mei noted.

China’s Ministry of Commerce defended the restrictions on raw materials at a press conference last week in Beijing, saying that if the US and the EU filed a WTO suit against China, the ministry would handle consultations positively with concerned countries.

China’s Ministry of Finance said in a statement Monday that China will abolish export duties on some industrial products and cut the duties for chemical fertilizers and nonferrous metals from July 1 to promote exports, according to Xinhua.

Export duties for some nonferrous metals including molybdenum, tungsten and indium will be halved to 5 percent, the statement said.

Kang Juan and Guo Qiang contributed to this story