China under pressure to live up to open market pledges as US calls for ‘reckoning’ over ‘unfair’ trade policies
US raises pressure ahead of World Trade Organisation review by accusing China of causing ‘serious harm’ by failing to live up to its commitments
China is under pressure to live up to its rhetoric and fully commit itself to opening up its economy in a World Trade Organisation review after the US called for a “reckoning” over what it described as unfair trade policies.
Dennis Shea, the US ambassador to the WTO, accused China of causing “serious harm” by failing to live up to free-trade principles.
The World Trade Organisation is conducting its biennial review of China’s compliance.
“Given China’s very large and growing role in international trade, and the serious harm that China’s state-led, mercantilist approach to trade and investment causes to China’s trading partners, this reckoning can no longer be put off,” he said.
“It is clear, moreover, that the WTO currently does not offer all of the tools necessary to remedy this situation,” Shea told the two-yearly WTO review of China’s trade policies on Wednesday.
But China’s vice-minister of commerce Wang Shouwen said significant changes have taken place since China’s accession to the WTO in 2001, adding that the country provided market opportunities for world goods and services.
“Between 2001, when China joined the WTO, and 2017, China’s imports of goods increased at an annual average rate of 13.5 per cent, twice as high as the world average,” he said.