Washington and Beijing have extended their trade truce, which limits the amount of tariffs and ensures the supply of Chinese rare earth elements to the US, by two months, US Treasury Secretary Scott Besant told “Fox News“, BTA reported.
The announcement of the extension of the truce, which expired on November 10, comes amid the visit to Washington by Chinese President Xi Jinping, who was welcomed by his US counterpart Donald Trump at the “Andrews“ Air Force Base late on Wednesday local time.
Trump and Xi agreed on a one-year trade truce during a meeting in South Korea in October last year. The agreement is being extended until January 10, Besant said, but added that Beijing must fulfill further commitments.
Before this week's summit, many expected the truce to be extended by six months or even more, CNBC points out.
“Today we agreed to extend the so-called “Busan Agreement“ – The economic truce between the two countries, which was supposed to end on November 10, will be extended until January 10 to give us more time to see what we can do economically,“ said Besant.
“The two-month extension suggests to me that the US is not happy with China's proposals and wants to keep up the pressure, and as an added bonus, Xi's participation in the G-20 summit in Miami is more likely,“ commented Scott Kennedy of the American analytical center “Center for Strategic and International Studies“.
According to Jens Eskelund, president of the European Chamber of Commerce in China, the extension of the trade truce alone does not solve the problems facing companies, including the lack of a standardized approach to applying for licenses to export rare earth elements.
Besant also outlined three possible scenarios for ending the conflict between the US and Iran - members of the regime in Tehran to turn on each other, the Iranian people to revolt, or Iranian representatives to finally sit down at the negotiating table and reach an agreement.
“First, the regime members to turn on each other - that is not impossible“, said the US Treasury Secretary, adding: “Second, there is some kind of uprising by the Iranian people. They have probably killed 50,000 of their own people, so that is very difficult. And third, to get the Iranians, if they want to make an agreement, to stick to it“, Besant stressed.