Donald Trump is alienating allies the US needs to confront China on trade, panel warns
A US advisory commission urges a united front against Chinese policies, not unilateral action
US President Donald Trump must join with the EU, Japan and other allies to form a united front against China, an advisory panel warned on Friday, adding that his aggressive trade actions against long-time US partners could undermine that effort.
The comments came during a special meeting of the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission on in Washington.
Nearly all the participants in the meeting, held “to address Chinese market distortions”, called on the Trump administration to initiate “big, bold” actions together with Washington’s traditional partners within the World Trade Organisation (WTO) framework.
“The US should file a broad-based WTO dispute jointly alongside America’s economic allies, the countries with market-oriented systems that confront the same challenges posed by China,” said Chad Bown, a senior fellow at the Washington-based think tank Peterson Institute for International Economics.
“The European Union and Japan have indicated a willingness to engage as evidenced by joint trade ministerial statements issued in Buenos Aires in December 2017, in Brussels in March 2018 and just last week in Paris,” added Bown, who served on former President Barack Obama’s White House Council of Economic Advisers.