EU Vows to Retaliate If U.S. Remains a 10% Baseline Tariff

TMTPOST -- The European Union has vowed to retaliate if its trade negotiations fail to remove the baseline reciprocal tariffs imposed by the Trump administration , according to a report on Wednesday.

Credit：Xinhua News Agency

The EU plans to hit U.S. imports including Boeing Co. aircraft with retaliatory tariffs if U.S. President Donald Trump sticks to a 10% baseline levy on the bloc’s goods, Bloomberg reported. “We will need to retaliate and rebalance in some key sectors if the US insists on an asymmetrical deal,” the EU’s industry chief, Stephane Sejourne, told the news media outlet, including if the “outcome of the negotiations is that a 10% tariff remains.”

While the report cited an EU official that trade negotiations have gained speed and the European Commission is making all efforts to reach a solution that benefits both sides, it noted EU officials expect Washington to keep some duties in place, even after negotiations are concluded. The commission, the EU executive arm that handles trade talks, has reportedly not indicated if that would draw retaliation from the bloc.

Trump on May 23 vowed to slap a 50% tariff starting on June 1 as negotiations between the EU and the United Sates “going nowhere.” However, after a phone with von der Leyen,Trump on May 25 said he would hold off until July 9, the same deadline as Trump’s 90-day pause of his proposed 20% reciprocal tariffs on EU that is set to end.

The EU has planned for possible countermeasures in case of failure to reach agreements with the Trump administration.The European Commission on May 8 said it has launched a public consultation on a list of US imports for the possible EU countermeasures, if ongoing EU-U.S. negotiations do not result in a mutually beneficial outcome and the removal of the US tariffs. The list of U.S. goods, which could be subject to the countermeasures, is totally worth of €95 billion, covering a broad range of industrial and agricultural products.

It was reported at last Friday that the U.S. is demanding what EU officials deem as unbalanced, unilateral concessions in ongoing trade talks, such as measures regarding to quotas for fish exports that European officials believe may be incompatible with World Trade Organization rules, tariffs-related moves that aren’t mutual, a series of demands on economic security, which were described by the officials as far-fetched.

Many of U.S. tariffs would remain even in the event of a deal, and the best-case scenario is to reach an agreement on principles, which would allow further talks to extend past the deadline of July 9, per a Bloomberg report. The reported demands may lead to EU’s tough decision on countermeasures if the terms of any deal don’t improve.

The EU readies retaliatory tariffs as a senior official recently has warned to make a “credible threat” of retaliation in Trump’s trade war is necessary if it wants to get a good deal with the U.S., the Financial Times (FT) reported on Tuesday.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was prepared to threaten retaliation to extract a better deal since a possible strong response would help convince Trump to cut his tariffs on EU, Bjoer Seibert, von der Leyen’s chief of staff told the EU’s ambassadors following the G7 summit in Canada last week, according to the report.

Seibert was reported to call for the EU ambassadors to support for the planned tariffs on €95 billion worth of U.S. goods, and reveal that the commission was also preparing measures hitting U.S. services, including levies on American tech companies and limiting access to public procurement contracts for American businesses.