China is Asia’s No 1 military, economic threat: US commerce chief Wilbur Ross

He also calls on Beijing to honour the US-China interim trade deal after it announced its recovery from the coronavirus outbreak
Beijing has bought around 70 per cent of its target for US agricultural products under the deal, but less of other items, Ross says

US-China relations

Wendy Wuin Beijing

Published: 1:22pm, 8 Dec 2020

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US Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross has called China the major economic and military threat to Asia, as the outgoing Donald Trump administration renewed its criticism of Beijing while calling on it to fulfil its commitments under the two countries’ interim trade deal.

“China continues to be both the largest potential market and the principal military and economic threat in the region,” Ross said in a recorded keynote speech at the Milken Institute 2020 Asian Summit on Tuesday.

He said the US commerce department had imposed 539 punitive tariffs of which 210 related to China, although without stating in which period of time. Washington had placed “a good portion” of Chinese companies on the US’ entity list, its trade blacklist, which requires licences for shipments of sensitive technology.

The Trump administration continues to impose sanctions and restrictions on Chinese companies and officials as its term comes to an end. US president-elect Joe Biden is expected to face bipartisan pressure to remain tough on China when he takes office next month.

China and the US signed their interim trade deal in January after nearly two years of painful negotiations. The US lowered tariffs on US$110 billion of Chinese goods to 7.5 per cent (25 per cent tariffs remained on US$250 billion of products), while China committed to buying US$200 billion worth of additional American goods and services over two years as well as speeding up approval of access to China’s market and improving its intellectual property protection.

Purchases by China slowed during its initial coronavirus outbreak before picking up in the summer, while trade has been one of the few spheres of engagement between Beijing and Washington as overall relations have plunged this year over issues including technology, Hong Kong, Xinjiang and the South China Sea.

Ross said at the summit that China had implemented 57 technical commitments and bought over US$23 billion worth of an agreed target of agricultural products.

“That’s around 70 per cent of the agreed total, but unfortunately they have purchased [lower] percentages of other items,” he said, without elaborating.

“Now China has announced its recovery from the pandemic, we hope they will meet the [deal’s] two-year target,” he said.

The deal fell short of addressing major structural issues in the Chinese economy that have long been a source of grievances for foreign investors. It was also criticised by European countries who viewed it as managed trade, violating the principles of the World Trade Organization.

In an interview last week with The New York Times, Biden said he would not immediately remove tariffs on Chinese goods without a full review of the interim trade deal and consultation with allies.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Monday to a group of US executives that Beijing would fulfil its commitments under the deal, Reuters reported, citing US-China Business Council president Craig Allen.

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Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi puts forward 5 proposals for more stable China-US ties

Wang also called for resuming economic dialogue and proposed to resume talks on a bilateral investment treaty, which ended without conclusion at the end of the Barack Obama administration.

Ross defended Trump’s withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact, the Iran nuclear deal and the Paris climate accord, but said the United States had continued its economic collaboration with Asia.

He also said that the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, or RCEP – signed among 15 Asia-Pacific countries last month – did not deal with the most sensitive issues of state-owned enterprises, subsidies, intellectual property protection and equal market access, and that its provisions on rules of origins were far weaker than those in the revised free-trade agreement between the US, Canada and Mexico.

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: China ‘No 1 threat to stability in region’

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