Afghan Voice Agency (AVA): The 10% US tariff on all imports from China will take effect today. US President Donald Trump has repeatedly warned Beijing that it is not doing enough to stop the flow of illegal drugs to the United States.
China's Ministry of Finance announced within minutes that it would impose a 15% tariff on imports of coal and liquefied natural gas (LNG) and a 10% tariff on imports of crude oil, agricultural equipment and some cars. The new tariffs on US exports will begin on February 10 (22 Dilu).
China also announced it would launch an antitrust investigation into Alphabet Inc.’s Google and added PVH Corp., the holding company for brands such as Calvin Klein, and U.S. biotech firm Illumina, to its list of untrustworthy entities.
China’s Ministry of Commerce and Customs also said they would impose export controls on tungsten, tellurium, ruthenium, molybdenum and ruthenium-related items to protect national security interests. China controls the bulk of the world’s supply of rare earth elements that are critical to clean energy technology.
On Monday, Trump backed off on his threat to impose 25 percent tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada at the last minute, agreeing to a 30-day moratorium in exchange for concessions on more border controls with the two neighboring countries, Reuters reported. But he gave China no such deadline, and a White House spokesman said Trump would not speak with Chinese President Xi Jinping until later this week.
During his first term in 2018, Trump launched a two-year trade war with China over the country’s huge trade surplus with the United States, with both sides imposing tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of goods, disrupting global supply chains and hurting the global economy.