WASHINGTON/BEIJING: Senior Chinese trade negotiator Li Chenggang is expected to travel to Washington this week to meet US officials, a United States government spokesperson confirmed.
Li, China’s international trade representative and a key negotiator alongside economy tsar He Lifeng, may meet deputy-level US government officials, the spokesperson said, adding that the visit was not part of a formal negotiating session.
The Wall Street Journal first reported on Monday (Aug 25) that Li would travel to Washington.
Traders on both sides of the Pacific are watching to see whether this month’s latest tariff truce will become permanent or if US President Donald Trump will once again upend global supply chains with a fresh wave of prohibitively high duties on Chinese imports.
US retailers are stocking up ahead of the critical end-of-year holiday season, while Chinese producers – locked out of the world’s top consumer economy – say they are in “survival mode”, scrambling to secure market share elsewhere to stay afloat.
The world’s two largest economies, on Aug 11, agreed to extend their tariff truce for another 90 days, locking in place a 30 per cent tariff on Chinese imports and 10 per cent Chinese duties on US goods.
But once Trump’s tariffs top 35 per cent, they become prohibitively high for Chinese exporters, economists warn.
The Chinese commerce ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Li’s trip would follow three previous rounds of trade negotiations between the two nations since May – in Geneva, London and, earlier this month, in Stockholm.
The last time a senior Chinese trade negotiator visited the US was in November 2023, when He Lifeng met then-US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen in San Francisco, ahead of the 2023 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ summit in the city.
Then vice-Premier Liu He, He Lifeng’s predecessor, was the last top Chinese trade official to travel to Washington for bilateral talks, signing the ‘Phase 1’ trade deal with the Trump administration in January 2020, committing Beijing to boost purchases of US exports by US$200 billion over a two-year period.
