EU says it is ready to wage trade war with USThe EU has warned that it will not “shoot from the hip” but is fully prepared for a trade war with the US amid heightened concerns that the bloc’s last minute crisis talks are doomed to fail. The main focus of the import tariffs is China, with whom the US has a $502tn (£365tn) trade deficit. The EU has suggested it is open to discussing the wider terms of trade with the US but only once it has received a permanent and unconditional exemption to the steel and aluminium tariffs. Speaking on Sunday in Abu Dhabi to Bloomberg TV, the Austrian chancellor, Sebastian Kurz, said a trade war would be “extremely negative” for both sides. “I hope that this won’t unleash any negative spiral that leads to a trade war and that, rather, the US will reconsider its ideas about trade barriers.”

Source: The Guardian April 30, 2018 09:33 UTC