Trade deal

Following a phone call discussion between China’s Vice Premier Liu He and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin on Friday Beijing time, the two countries agreed to improve favorable conditions for the implementation of the bilateral trade deal and cooperate on the economy and public health. Both sides also expected to maintain conversations. “Both sides agreed that good progress is being made on creating the governmental infrastructures necessary to make the agreement a success,” according to an emailed statement after the call from the USTR. “In spite of the current global health emergency, both countries fully expect to meet their obligations under the agreement in a timely manner.” The U.S. President Donald Trump has criticized on how China handled the coronavirus outbreak, therefore the phone happened amid the war of words over US’s criticism before it likely to create escalating tension between those two nations. Earlier Trump and other U.S. top officials have accused China for the deaths of many people from the covid-19 and have weighed punitive actions against China, including possible tariffs and shifting supply chains away. The ongoing pandemic has severely harm the world’s two biggest economies and disrupted global supply chains. Under the trade deal signed on January, China agreed to increase its purchase of $200 billion in U.S. goods and services over two years compared with 2017’s level, otherwise the purchases so far have been behind the target as goods imports from the U.S. declined by 5.9% in the first four months of 2020 from a year ago due to the coronavirus outbreak. The two countries will continue to talk every six months under the trade agreement via conference call on a regular basis, the U.S. office said.