LONDON — The British government is working to give its trade chief new powers to move faster in imposing higher tariffs on imports, as it faces pressure from Brussels and Washington to combat Chinese industrial overcapacity. Under new rules drawn up by British officials, Trade Secretary Peter Kyle will have the power to direct the Trade Remedies Authority (TRA) to launch investigations and give ministers options to set higher duty levels to protect domestic businesses. The trade watchdog will be required to set out the results of anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations within a year, better monitor trade distortions and streamline processes for businesses to prompt trade probes. The U.K. is in negotiations with the U.S. and the EU to forge a steel alliance to counter Chinese overcapacity as the bloc works to introduce its own updated safeguards regime. The EU is the U.K.’s largest market and Brussels is creating a new steel protection regime that is set to slash Britain’s tariff-free export quotas and place 50 percent duties on any in excess. The government said its directive to the TRA will align the U.K. with similar powers in the EU and Australia, and follow World Trade Organization rules. It is set out in a Strategic Steer to the watchdog and will be introduced as part of the finance bill due to be wrapped up in the spring. “We are strengthening the U.K.’s system for tackling unfair trade to give our producers and manufacturers — especially SMEs who have less capacity and capability — the backing they need to grow and compete,” Business and Trade Secretary Peter Kyle said in a statement. “By streamlining processes and aligning our framework with international peers, we are ensuring U.K. industry has the tools to protect jobs, attract investment and thrive in a changing global economy,” Kyle added. These moves come after the government said on Wednesday that its Steel Strategy, which plots the future of the industry in Britain and new trade protections for the sector, will be delayed until next year. The Trump administration has been concerned about the U.K.’s steps to counter China’s steel overcapacity and refused to lower further a 25 percent tariff carve-out for Britain’s steel and aluminum exports from the White House’s 50 percent global duties on the metals. Trade Secretary Kyle discussed lowering the Trump administration’s tariffs on U.K. steel with senior U.S. Cabinet members in Washington on Wednesday.  “We are very much on the case of trying to sort out precisely where we land with the EU safeguard,” Trade Minister Chris Bryant told parliament Thursday, after meeting with EU Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič on Wednesday for negotiations. “We will do everything we can to make sure that we have a strong and prosperous steel sector across the whole of the U.K.,” Bryant said. The TRA has also launched a new public-facing Import Trends Monitor tool to help firms detect surges in imports that could harm their business and provide evidence that could prompt an investigation by the watchdog. “We welcome the government’s strategic steer, which marks a significant milestone in our shared goal to make the U.K.’s trade remedies regime more agile, accessible and assertive, as well as providing greater accountability,” said the TRA’s Co-Chief Executives Jessica Blakely and Carmen Suarez. Sophie Inge and Jon Stone contributed reporting.

An emerging U.S.-China detente gives European leaders breathing room to find a strategy on trade, raw materials and the war in Ukraine — but the thaw between the two great powers risks pushing European interests to the side.   President Donald Trump and his counterpart Xi Jinping agreed to a significant de-escalation in their trade spat during a head-to-head Thursday in South Korea, pausing export controls on rare earth magnets and other critical raw materials for 12 months.   While the move is good news for European companies that have been caught in the crossfire, other sticking points in the Europe-China relationship will be harder to resolve, even with the gift of time.  Brussels, under pressure from Trump and in pursuit of its own strategic interests, is trying — without notable success — to sway Beijing from supporting Russia in its war on Ukraine.   At the same time the EU is doing its best to keep the temperature down in its longstanding trade standoff with China, whose intensity has ratcheted up recently with the imposition of limits on exports of critical raw materials and microchips. Both measures have had an immediate negative impact on European industry, particularly automakers which were already struggling prior to the restrictions.  Fears of lasting, irreversible damage to Europe’s industries have led the EU to take a more conciliatory stance in its trade standoff, emphasizing engagement and dialogue rather than punitive measures.  Yet Chinese officials have balked at the slow and uncoordinated pace of discussions with the EU, leading Beijing to drop Europe down its list of priorities, according to Jeremy Chan, a senior analyst at Eurasia Group.  “The EU is a secondary at best, maybe a tertiary or a non-consideration for both Washington and Beijing in these negotiations,” Chan told POLITICO.  ‘LET THEM FIGHT’ The top political priority for the EU is ending the war in Ukraine — something that Trump while on the campaign trail promised to do within his first 24 hours in office. Almost a year into his term, the fighting continues, aided by China propping up Russia’s economy through investments and oil purchases.  At the urging of the White House, the EU included Chinese banks and refineries in its two latest rounds of sanctions targeting Russia, arguing the entities were helping Moscow evade sanctions. This prompted an angry response from top Chinese officials including Prime Minister Li Qiang, who branded the sanctions “unacceptable” during a meeting with European Council President Antonio Costa in Asia this week, per an EU official.  European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and the bloc’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, have both called out Beijing’s support for Moscow in explicit terms, with the former saying in July that it has a “direct and dangerous impact on European security.”  The EU’s latest sanctions prompted an angry response from top Chinese officials including Prime Minister Li Qiang, who branded them “unacceptable” at a meeting with European Council President Antonio Costa, per an EU official. | Pool photo by Vincent Thian via AFP/Getty Images Ukraine had hoped Trump would pressure Beijing to stop buying Russian oil, but the American president told media on Air Force One that the issue was not on the table — although he did say the war in Ukraine “came up very strongly,” with both sides hoping to find an end to the fighting.   “He’s going to help us and we’re going to work together on Ukraine,” Trump said, referring to the Chinese president. INDUSTRIES HELD HOSTAGE While China’s export controls were not directed at the EU, the bloc’s companies faced long delays and sharp price hikes in contending with the subsequent shortage of raw materials and magnets. China accounts for 98 percent of the EU’s rare earth permanent magnets.  The geopolitical firestorm sent the European Commission into overdrive to secure its own supplies of the magnets and launch a plan to diversify Europe’s supply chain by the end of the year.   But the EU has been here before. Just two years ago it passed the Critical Raw Materials Act to solve this exact problem, and yet all the deals that have been signed have failed to deliver actual products. Its latest scheme is big on ideas and short on specifics.   The one-year pause on export controls agreed between Trump and Xi affords the EU some time to put that plan into action and leverage its other alliances — including efforts unfolding at the G7 this week with Canada, along with the U.K., Italy, France and Germany seeking to diversify away from China’s grip.  But for companies looking for clarity, the catch is that none of the agreements made between Trump and Xi are binding.  “As long as we don’t see any details hammered out and put on paper it leaves a lot of room for both sides backtracking and applying various other conditions, so I don’t think that this is really settled,” said Alexander Gabuev, director of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center.  SECURITY CONCERNS  In the U.K., pressure is expected to build for policymakers to use the temporary U.S. truce to minimize the risks from China.  British PM Keir Starmer has thus far failed to resolve longstanding tensions between “securocrats” in parliament and Whitehall, who want to see a tougher stance toward Beijing, and those who argue for a closer embrace in order to boost inward investment. Prominent members of the government have traveled to Beijing in pursuit of strengthened ties since Starmer took office, despite his overriding foreign policy aim of cleaving close to Trump.  China has become a particular sore point for Starmer in recent weeks due to the collapse of the prosecution of two men accused of spying for Beijing, while ministers have yet to decide the fate of a planned Chinese “super-embassy” in London.  Back in the EU, divisions among member countries over how to counter China’s power — and any subsequent retribution — make a unified stance toward Beijing on trade or dumping measures unlikely.   Brussels got a glimpse of its internal factions when it slapped duties on made-in-China electric vehicles following an anti-subsidy investigation. Automakers and their political benefactors fear Chinese brands will dump their overcapacity in the European market, bringing a severe price war to Europe’s shores.   Yet for all the handwringing over how to protect domestic automakers, the votes of EU capitals on the duties revealed how economically exposed each is to China, with Germany launching a last-minute appeal to stop the duties.  The Netherlands is the latest EU member on the outs with China after Dutch authorities seized control of chipmaker Nexperia, prompting Beijing to hit back with export controls on Nexperia’s Chinese-produced chips. The shortage could halt production lines across Europe in less than a week, showcasing just how economically dependent Europe has become on China.  LET’S BE FRIENDS From the jump, Trump framed his sojourn to Asia as a “G2” summit, stoking fears that any deal would sideline other countries or that “British and European trade priorities could be overlooked or traded away without consultation,” said David Taylor, director of policy and programs at Asia House.  Sensing its declining influence in the Trump-Xi bromance, the EU is looking to bolster its trade ties elsewhere.  Trade chief Maroš Šefčovič is traveling to Australia in late November to chair an inaugural dialogue between the EU and the 12 members of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership bloc, two diplomats told POLITICO. The dialogue is meant to deepen economic and political ties between the EU and countries keen to maintain established global trade rules.  Brussels, under pressure from Donald Trump and in pursuit of its own strategic interests, is trying to sway Beijing from supporting Russia in its war on Ukraine. | Jim Watson/Getty Images Brussels will have a chance to do just that when it hosts a delegation of high-level Chinese officials on Friday. They’re expected to meet with the Commission’s trade deputy-director general, Denis Redonnet, and other senior officials.  Experts caution that Europe will need to maintain pressure on Beijing to get any movement on its priorities.   “Europe cannot just simply be waiting to see what happens on talks between [the] United States and China,” said Ignacio Garcia Bercero, a former director at the Commission’s trade department. “It needs to develop its own channel of dialogue with China.” 

LONDON — Britain is pushing to form a Western alliance with the European Union to curb China’s dominance in the global steel market, multiple figures familiar with the talks told POLITICO.  The hope in London is that a coordinated approach could help the U.K. dodge the new tariffs Brussels plans to impose — a 50 percent duty aimed at shielding EU producers from China’s industrial overproduction. Britain, which finds itself at the mercy of EU trade action post-Brexit, is currently seeking carve-outs from those measures. The idea under consideration is for the U.K. and EU to form a Western steel alliance — potentially including Washington — that would align tariff policies and grant members preferential tariffs on steel trade. A senior EU official said earlier this month that the bloc had “no other choice” but to defend its industry, warning Europe was “in deep trouble because of this problem of overcapacities.” Still, the official left the door open to talks with London, urging both sides to sit down to negotiate. One other EU official, granted anonymity to speak freely about ongoing talks, said the concept of a steel “club” has been circulating for “quite some time” but is now looking “more appealing.” They added that the EU and U.K. already cooperate in multilateral forums such as the Global Forum on Steel Excess Capacity. The two sides have already agreed to align their upcoming carbon taxes on imports of steel and other products produced through highly polluting manufacturing processes. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer called for stronger coordination against Chinese steel earlier this month, warning that the “current international trade rules are inadequate” and questioning “the political will of foreign members to take action.” U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer called for stronger coordination against Chinese steel earlier this month. | Andrew Harnik/Getty Images Britain currently sends half of its steel exports to the EU, making the bloc’s upcoming tariffs a serious threat to U.K. producers. UK Steel Director Gareth Stace said the government’s “focus must be on securing essential U.K. carve outs in the EU’s quotas, and tightening its own trade defenses.” But the lobby group boss added that a broader alliance could help to resolve global overcapacity issues and keep heavily subsidized imports out of Britain. A U.K. government spokesperson said: “We are continuing our engagement with the EU following their recent announcement. We are also working with international partners on solutions which can address wider overcapacity.”

European lawmakers accused Commission President Ursula von der Leyen of striking a bad, one-sided trade deal with U.S. President Donald Trump after she defended the accord in her annual State of the Union address Wednesday.  “Where was Europe when you signed an unfair deal with Trump?” asked Socialists & Democrats leader Iratxe García Pérez. Responding to von der Leyen’s speech, she called the EU’s decision to accept a 15 percent tariff on most EU exports while scrapping its own tariffs on U.S. industrial goods “unacceptable.”  The EU’s strategic autonomy, said García Pérez, has been buried “under a golf course.”  She was referring to the trade deal that von der Leyen struck with Trump at his Turnberry resort in Scotland in July. Von der Leyen and her aides have defended the deal as the best that could be done in difficult circumstances. Many critics fear, however, that it will condemn the bloc to an era of economic subjugation. Ahead of Wednesday’s speech, the European Socialists had already come out against the deal — and others leaped at the chance to criticize the agreement or voice specific concerns.  Both on the left and radical-right side of the Parliament, the truce with Trump was criticized widely. Martin Schirdewan, the German leader for The Left, said that “fighting overcapacity with more trade is like throwing lighters on the fire of the European economic crisis.” LEFT-RIGHT PILE ON Bas Eickhout of the Greens and Jordan Bardella of the right-wing Patriots for Europe both slammed von der Leyen’s promise that the EU would buy €750 billion in U.S. energy — mostly fossil-based — albeit for very different reasons.  Eickhout argued that, amid climate change, this money should be invested into European renewable energy. Bardella claimed, falsely, that EU countries would be coughing up that amount. In reality, this number is based on projections of investments and market developments, not hard agreements. While less harsh in her assessment, Valérie Hayer, chief of the liberal Renew Europe group, urged von der Leyen to “continue standing firm” on the bloc’s regulatory power and autonomy in trade talks. Trump has repeatedly attacked the EU’s digital rulebook, arguing that it puts U.S. companies at a disadvantage. European People’s Party leader Manfred Weber — von der Leyen’s political ally and fellow German conservative — seemed relatively isolated in his defense of the trade deal, asking: “What is the alternative to Scotland?” In her speech, von der Leyen called on lawmakers to support the agreement. Their votes will be needed to pass legislation to scrap the EU tariffs on U.S. industrial goods, which in turn would unlock a reduction in the levies on European cars being exported to the U.S. “I have heard many things about the deal we agreed on over the summer,” she said in her hour-long address. “I understand the initial reactions … But when you account for the exceptions that we secured and the additional rates which others have on top — we have the best agreement. Without any doubt.” “The deal provides crucial stability in our relations with the U.S. at a time of grave global insecurity,” she told MEPs. “Think of the repercussions of a full-fledged trade war with the U.S.” Trump, however, is ready to demand more and on Tuesday told the EU it should put 100 percent tariffs on both China and India to pressure them into abandoning support for Russian leader Vladimir Putin and his war against Ukraine, the Financial Times and other news outlets reported. Von der Leyen, in her speech, did not respond to the U.S. demands, but did stress the need to keep up the pressure on Russia. “We need more sanctions,” she said, referring to a 19th round of measures that will prioritize phasing out imports of fossil fuels more quickly. This proposal is expected to land this week, with negotiations between EU governments to follow. 

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen took aim on Tuesday at China’s industrial overproduction, export restrictions and its support for Russia’s war against Ukraine. In a statement to the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Von der Leyen stressed that “our relations with China must be rooted in a clear-eyed assessment of the new reality.” The remarks set the stage for a contentious summit later this month at which EU leaders will raise Beijing’s “no-limits partnership” with Vladimir Putin’s Russia. “We can say that China is de facto enabling Russia’s war economy, and we cannot accept this,” she told European lawmakers. On the economic front, the relationship between Europe and China will need rebalancing, de-risking and a diplomatic boost when it comes to climate change and environmental issues, Von der Leyen argued.  She started by complimenting China as great global civilization that over the past 50 years has become a great global power. But her praise quickly gave way to criticism, as she accused Beijing of operating outside of international rules and flooding global markets “with subsidized overcapacity — not just to boost its own industries, but to choke international competition.” China runs “the largest trade surplus in the history of mankind,” she went on to say, while European companies were finding it harder to do business on the Chinese market where they faced systematic discrimination. The increasing barriers faced by European companies in China include requiring foreign companies to keep localized staff; host research and development functions; and keep all IT data in the country, according to an EU Chamber of Commerce in China survey. “I’ve always said it: Europe is fully committed to result-oriented engagement with China,” von der Leyen said, calling on Beijing to engage in a meaningful dialogue that leads to actual change. “If our partnership is to go forward, we need a genuine rebalancing.”  For all von der Leyen’s finger wagging, the EU is looking to copy some of China’s more successful industrial policies, including its own technology transfers and procurement laws.  Under its newly revised rules on state aid, EU governments are being encouraged to include European preference criteria in their bidding processes, as well as other forms of aid, particularly as the bloc looks to create a domestic battery sector. In the Automotive Action Plan — the EU’s strategy for making its carmakers competitive — the executive has said it would look into direct support for European manufacturers. The EU is making public funds available for battery makers, including for non-EU companies so long as they are in a joint venture with a domestic partner and sharing know-how, technical expertise and technology. The EU-China summit, called to mark 50 years of diplomatic relations, will be held in Beijing on July 24. A second summit day has been canceled. President Xi Jinping is not expected to attend, and the Chinese delegation will be led by premier Li Qiang.

PARIS — President Donald Trump’s decision to double steel import tariffs to 50 percent is a misguided blow to America’s allies, the European Union’s chief trade negotiator said Wednesday, warning the real threat lies in global overcapacity rather than in the bloc’s steel exports. Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič, speaking after talks with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer in Paris, said that Europe was not the source of the problem — which is global overcapacity — that the Trump administration was seeking to address with the tariff.  “We are not bringing problems,” Šefčovič told reporters, pointing to the fact that the EU exports only about 4 million tons of highly specialized steel.  “Let’s not target each other, but let’s work together [on] how to address this global overcapacity issue.” His comments came after Trump signed an order overnight to hike U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum to the prohibitive level of 50 percent. The United Kingdom is the only country exempted, facing only a 25 percent tariff on the metals.  China, India, Japan, the United States and Russia are the world’s top steel producers, according to data from the World Steel Association.  MOMENTUM PLAY Talks between the EU and U.S. are otherwise “advancing in the right direction,” Šefčovič said: “Our goal, of course, is to maintain the momentum.” The trade commissioner noted how much has been achieved in talks with Washington in recent months, adding that they were now focusing on “very concrete” issues, such as economic security, tariff lines and market access. Greer struck an equally positive tone, saying that “negotiations are advancing quickly.” “Today’s meeting in Paris … was very constructive and indicates a willingness by the EU to work with us to find a concrete way forward to achieve reciprocal trade,” Greer said in a press release. While the U.S. has listed the trade barriers it faces in its dealings with the EU, Šefčovič reiterated that there is also room for positive engagement with Washington on semiconductors, AI chips, liquefied natural gas purchases and developing a common approach on raw materials as well as tackling the global steel glut.  Pressure is however ramping up on Brussels to find an agreement with the White House, with a temporary truce on tariffs lapsing in early July.  “We should do our utmost to find an amicable solution and to get the deal before July 9. It’s clearly the ambition from our side, and I think that is also the ambition from the U.S. side,” Šefčovič told reporters.  Brussels and Washington agreed to step up the pace of talks in late May, after Trump threatened to impose a 50 percent tariff on all European goods. The European Commission, however, warned this week it would hit back with up to €120 billion in retaliatory tariffs, should there be no mutually beneficial agreement. Wednesday’s meeting, on the sidelines of an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development trade ministerial, is the first to be held between EU and U.S. negotiators on European soil since Trump took office in January.  Šefčovič has paid three publicly disclosed visits to Washington in a bid to negotiate away the U.S. tariffs. This story has been updated.

BRUSSELS — For decades, European governments accepted that the decline of their polluting, loss-making steel industries was inevitable and irreversible. No more. After years of neglect, developed economies are discovering they don’t want to depend on even dirtier sources of steel made in China, Southeast Asia and North Africa. The bloated global steel sector — “overcapacity” in the jargon — is nothing new. What’s new is U.S. President Donald Trump’s 25 percent tariffs on the metal. That means even more subsidized steel will head to the region from China, Indonesia, Turkey and Egypt that has been shut out of the American market. The bailout is starting. The U.K. has just renationalized its only steel plant that makes the metal from scratch. Last month, the EU launched a Steel Action Plan to revive the sector and stave off total collapse. And Australia is shelling out billions to turn a steel plant into a green pioneer. In the EU, €9 billion of state aid has been approved over the last few years. The Steel Action Plan will push defense research to expand the customer base in Europe. Another €100 billion is on the way to support scaling up carbon-free production. Policy incentives should help as well, such as making sure there’s a market for more expensive, but less polluting, steel. “We need to go even further,” French Industry and Energy Minister Marc Ferracci told reporters on a recent visit to the eastern steelmaking region of Alsace. Steel major ArcelorMittal has just announced it would cut around 600 jobs in France, with more to go in Belgium, too. The context, Ferracci said, is simple. “Chinese steel that is massively subsidized” has been pummeling the EU for years, chipping away at the market share of domestic steel. Added to that, are the “tariffs decided by the American administration,” he said. SUNSET INDUSTRY It’s not an easy sell. As it stands, the sector is not ready for the future, said steel transformation expert Boris Jankowiak at the Climate Action Network, a federation of NGOs. “At the moment we have a fossil-based steel industry that is facing several struggles,” he told POLITICO. “It’s not going to get better by sticking with fossil fuels.” Buying up a primary steel plant, as the U.K. government did, will not solve energy prices, slumping demand or reliance on coal and gas. From the Commission’s action plan, the contours are clear: energy prices need to come down, certain sectors need to start buying cleaner European steel over “dirty” foreign steel — and we need to recycle more. “All the pieces of the puzzle are there,” Jankowiak said. “So now it’s just about showing leadership and commitment to that transformation — also from the companies’ side.” Developed economies are discovering they don’t want to depend on even dirtier sources of steel made in China, Southeast Asia and North Africa. | Alex Plavevski/EPA Steel plants across the EU, like Italy’s Taranto works, have faced criticism for polluting the air, water and soil. Not many people are, understandably, happy to have a coking plant in their backyard. But, luckily, steel goes into so many products that it can be molded into whatever the Zeitgeist requires. Back in 2020, it was the green transition. Then, steel was heralded as the core of renewable energy, enabling local production of wind turbines (instead of importing them from China). “Green” battle tanks are the most recent argument. When he presented the Steel Action Plan at a plant in Germany’s post-industrial Ruhr region last month, European Industry Commissioner Stéphane Séjourné stressed that it was a crucial cog “in the economic and material sovereignty of the entire European continent.” The action plan itself points out that a main battle tank contains 60 tons of steel. Séjourné’s plan was received positively by the sector and the EU countries who produce the most steel: Germany produces about a quarter, with Italy coming in second at around 10 percent. France, Romania and Poland each account for more than 7 percent of the European total, based on figures from lobby group Eurofer. The sector is spread widely across the bloc, with just five countries producing no steel. Post-Covid and in the middle of attempts to get rid of Europe’s decade-long dependency on Russian gas, a fresh dependency on basic Chinese industrial inputs is Brussels’ worst nightmare. Aside from security, there’s also employment. Ferracci said the French government is “supporting Arcelor’s decarbonization projects, which should help maintain jobs. Now, it’s time for these projects to materialize.” Some 300,000 people work in the steel industry in the EU, with another 37,000 in the U.K. While that is not much on the total labor market, once you lose steel, it could well spell the end for other much larger industries like carmaking or — indeed — defense and green energy. “It’s a similar shift [like the pandemic or Ukraine in 2022], but this time it is accelerating to an unprecedented pace,” a Commission official told POLITICO last month, pointing to the trinity of action plans on defense, industry and financing. Jankowiak, from the Climate Action Network, cautioned against “catchy” applications for steel. “Can production of tanks really create enough demand for steel on an industry level? And in the long term, this would rely on the tanks and artillery shells to be used — in case a war is actually waged. And this is not what we are calling for.” Nicolas Camut contributed to this report.

China is to lift sanctions on five current and former MEPs who have criticized its human right violations, according to a senior Parliament official, clearing the way for trade talks between the two superpowers. European Parliament President Roberta Metsola will break the news to political group leaders during a closed-door meeting on Wednesday, said the official, whom POLITICO granted anonymity to speak about internal deliberations. Last week, Metsola’s spokesperson confirmed that negotiations to end the sanctions between the Parliament and the Chinese government were in “their final stages.” The lifting of sanctions comes against the backdrop of a decision by United States President Donald Trump to upend international trade relations by slapping tariffs on imports, with the most punitive levies falling on China. The resulting uncertainty has jump-started EU trade negotiations with countries around the world. Since China imposed the sanctions on the five MEPs in 2021, the Parliament has held an unofficial veto on China, conditioning any potential diplomatic contact on Beijing’s lifting the sanctions. European Parliament lawmakers have not toned down their criticism of China, arguing that President Xi Jinping’s aggressive trade and industrial policy and human rights violations must not go unchecked. The Parliament’s leading MEP on international trade, Bernd Lange, said that despite the green light to engage with their Chinese counterparts, many obstacles remain to a smooth EU-China trade relationship. “We are very concerned about China’s industrial policy that leads to market distortions and creates overcapacity that floods the world market,” he said, adding he also wants to “discuss intensively” the market access barriers China has imposed. “Facts do not change with lifting of sanctions,” said French Socialist MEP Raphaël Glucksmann, one of the sanctioned MEPs.  “We are talking about mass deportations, systematic forced labour, atrocities against the Uyghurs, brutal repression and human rights violations in Hong Kong, threats, interference, and intimidations against Taiwan, and so many other grave human rights violations,” Glucksmann added. The other sanctioned MEPs are Bulgarian liberal Ilhan Kyuchyuk, center-right Slovak Miriam Lexmann, and two Germans: Green Reinhard Bütikofer and Christian Democrat Michael Gahler. The EU and China have increased contacts in recent months. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez visited President Xi in mid-April, and EU Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič recently held exchanges with his Chinese counterparts. A high-level EU-China summit is slated for July. The spokesperson for the Chinese mission to the EU didn’t respond to a request for comment.

BRUSSELS — The EU is pushing the Donald Trump administration to take the bloc’s offer to negotiate seriously on tariffs, after Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič met top U.S. trade officials in Washington on Monday. In a written statement outlining the meeting, the European Commission’s trade spokesperson Olof Gill said “significant joint efforts” will be required during the 90-day period of suspended tariffs that will last until mid-July. “The EU is doing its part,” the statement said. “Now, it is necessary for the U.S. to define its position. As with every negotiation, this must be a two-way street / two-way engagement, with both sides bringing something to the table.” The statement echoes a complaint by Šefčovič a few weeks back that the Trump administration was failing to engage. Šefčovič met with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and several high-ranking officials from the U.S. Treasury Department. The meeting lasted several hours, the Commission said. The EU has paused its retaliation against Trump’s steel and aluminum tariffs, even though the U.S. kept in place a 10 percent universal tariff on all trading partners and 25 percent levies on cars, steel and aluminum. A higher 20 percent tariff that Trump imposed on the EU is suspended for 90 days. “The meeting yesterday covered a lot of ground, from tariffs to non-tariff barriers. It explored the scope for a fair and mutually beneficial deal,” Gill said. The talks went over the EU’s zero-for-zero proposal on industrial products, global overcapacity — a reference to Chinese subsidies — and “the resilience of our supply chains in semiconductors and pharmaceuticals.” The EU’s 27 top ambassadors will receive a briefing from the Commission later on Tuesday on the D.C. meeting. Meanwhile, the bloc’s executive will keep at it, including preparing for potential U.S. tariffs on semiconductors and pharmaceuticals. “The Commission also continues with our preparatory work on additional countermeasures, should the negotiations fail to result in a successful outcome,” Gill said.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said she had “a good discussion on our shared challenges as allies” with U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance in Paris on Tuesday. The sit-down was the first time top EU and U.S. officials met after the election of Donald Trump, who announced 25 percent steel and aluminum tariffs on the rest of the world overnight. Von der Leyen labeled Vance as an ally just hours after she vowed Brussels would hit back against Trump’s tariffs. Von der Leyen also hinted at cooperating over global overproduction of steel, mainly coming from China. After a meeting in the margins of an AI Summit in France, Von der Leyen welcomed Vance to Europe via a post on Elon Musk’s X platform. “From security and stability to the great promise of technology and the critical challenge of non-market overcapacity,” she said.  Non-market overcapacity is trade lingo for China and a host of other countries making more steel than the EU requires, often aided by state aid that Europe, the U.S. and Japan cannot offer.  Vance told reporters that the “Trump administration has been very clear that we care a lot about Europe,” according to Reuters. “We see a lot of economic relationship to build upon … we also want to make sure that we’re actually engaged in a security partnership” which is good for both sides.