BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s Commerce Minister Wang Wentao will visit Europe in the coming days for discussions on the European Union’s anti-subsidy case against China-made electric vehicles (EVs) as a vote on imposing more EV tariffs looms.
Wang will hold talks with the European Commission’s Executive Vice President and Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis on Sept. 19, a spokesperson at the Chinese ministry said at a regular news conference.
The announcement of Wang’s Europe trip followed the visit of Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez to China earlier this week where he unexpectedly said the EU should reconsider its position.
The European Commission, which oversees EU trade policies, is on the brink of proposing final tariffs of up to 35.3% on EVs built in China, on top of the EU’s standard 10% car import duty.
The proposed final duties will be subject to a vote by the EU’s 27 members. They will be implemented by the end of October unless a qualified majority of 15 EU members representing 65% of the EU population vote against the levies.
“We don’t need another trade war,” said Sanchez in China on Wednesday. “If you ask me, we need to reconsider our position.”
Until now, Spain had been one of the more public supporters of EU tariffs on China-made EVs.
The comments from Sanchez reflect “rational and objective thinking” on his part, Mao Ning, a spokesperson at the Chinese foreign ministry, said on Thursday.
“(China hopes the EU) would work with the Chinese side to deal with the friction of economic and trade issues through dialogue and negotiation, so as to promote healthy and stable development of economic and trade relations between China and the EU,” she said at a regular news conference.
(Reporting by Joe Cash, Jing Xu and Ethan Wang; Writing by Ryan Woo; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)
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