China has made unprecedented proposals in talks with the US on a range of issues, including forced technology transfer, as the two sides work to overcome remaining obstacles to a deal to end their protracted trade dispute, US officials said on Wednesday.
China put proposals on the table in the talks that went further than in the past, including on technology transfer, said one of four senior US administration officials who spoke to reporters.
Negotiators have made progress on the details of the written agreements that have been hashed out to address US concerns, he said.
“If you looked at the texts a month ago compared to today, we have moved forward in all areas. We aren’t yet where we want to be,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“They’re talking about forced technology transfer in a way that they’ve never wanted to talk about before — both in terms of scope and specifics,” he said, referring to Chinese negotiators.
He declined to give further detail.
Reuters reported previously that the two sides were working on written agreements in six areas: forced technology transfer and cybertheft, intellectual property rights, services, currency, agriculture and non-tariff barriers to trade.
US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and US Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin arrived in Beijing yesterday for a new round of talks with Chinese officials to work on a deal that would end a months-long trade dispute that has cost both sides billions of US dollars and hurt global economic growth.
The Chinese Ministry of Commerce yesterday said that Chinese Vice Premier Liu He (劉鶴) was to hold trade talks with Lighthizer and Mnuchin last night.
The talks were expected to last for a full day today, ministry spokesman Gao Feng (高峰) told reporters at a regular briefing.
The in-person talks, which are to be followed by a round in Washington next week, are the first face-to-face meetings the two sides have held in weeks after missing an initial end-of-the month goal for a summit between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to sign a pact.
Talks would continue as long as progress is being made on the core issues, the official said.
“It could go to May, June, no one knows. It could happen in April, we don’t know,” another Trump administration official said.
The two sides still have differences over intellectual property and how to enforce a deal, he said.
China wants the US to lift its tariffs as part of a deal. Washington, which is cognizant that the tariffs give it leverage to ensure Beijing follows through on any commitments it makes, is wary of lifting them right away.
Trump last week said that the US might leave tariffs on Chinese goods for a “substantial period” to ensure compliance.
“Some tariffs will stay,” the second official said. “There’s going to be some give on that, but we’re not going to get rid of all the tariffs. We can’t.”
The topic will be addressed in upcoming talks.
“Obviously that is an issue that we need to resolve ... and will be an important part of a final deal,” the first official said.
He said there was some agreement on enforcement on what he termed the “back end” once a deal was in place: a structure in which both sides could raise grievances and implement tariffs if there were breaches to the agreement.
He said that the focus of talks had shifted from Chinese purchases of US goods to the trickier structural issues, which he said Trump wanted as part of a “great” deal.
Bipartisan support at home for his tough stance on China, as well as from the business community, have emboldened Trump as he pushes for a deal that addresses long-standing complaints on trade, the source said.
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