China warned Monday that U.S. President Donald Trump’s latest tariff moves could harm the China-U.S. trade relationship, at the end of high-level talks in Paris.
Li Chenggang, China’s international trade representative, said the Chinese side had expressed serious concern about trade investigations into manufacturing in foreign countries that the Trump administration launched after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down its earlier tariffs. Li told journalists, “We are concerned that the possible results of such investigations may interfere with or damage the hard-won and stable China-U.S. economic and trade relations.”
Li said the sides discussed the possible extension of tariffs and non-tariff measures on both sides. He said China also expressed concern about likely uncertainty as the U.S. adjusts its measures, and that both sides agreed to make efforts to keep the tariffs stable.
The meeting was meant to prepare for Trump’s planned trip to China in about two weeks, though Trump has warned the visit could be delayed. Li did not address the possibility and did not take questions.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who led the U.S. delegation in Paris, said the talks “were constructive and they show the stability in the relationship.” Bessent said the purpose of the meetings was “to prevent any retaliation.”
Bessent’s remarks came as officials set expectations for a potential Trump-Xi meeting. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, accompanying Bessent, said the talks sketched out “the general terms of a work plan” for a Trump-Xi meeting so that it could produce “potential deliverables.” Greer said they also covered the trade investigations that concern China.
Greer said the talks began with a preview of U.S. trade policy as the government adjusts to the Supreme Court. “We started these talks, really, by giving them a preview of what we’re doing on U.S. trade policy as we adjust to the Supreme Court,” Greer said. He added that “the president’s trade policy hasn’t changed,” while “our tools may change, and we’re conducting these investigations,” and said the teams did not want to “prejudge” the investigations.
The planned China visit would be the first for a U.S. president since Trump went in his first term in 2017. It would come five months after Trump met President Xi Jinping in Busan.
Officials also discussed potential complications tied to the Iran war. The AP reported that the Iran war had emerged as a potential stumbling block as the U.S. and China tried to patch up relations after a tariff war in which import taxes soared to triple digits, and after the two sides later agreed to a one-year truce.
Trump has suggested he may delay the China visit while seeking Beijing’s help to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and calm oil prices that have risen during the Iran war. Bessent said any postponement would not be meant to pressure China on that issue.
“If the president’s visit is postponed, it would have nothing to do with the Chinese making a commitment to the Straits of Hormuz,” Bessent told journalists. “It would obviously be in their interest to do so, but a postponement would not be as a result of any asks from the president not being met,” he said. “The postponement, if it happens, would be because the commander in chief of the United States military believes that he should stay in the United States while this war is being prosecuted.”