After China and the United States temporarily reached an agreement on tariff issues and issued a joint statement, Europe's mentality was still somewhat uneasy.

According to a May 13 Reuters report, European Commission Executive Vice-President and Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis said that China and the US had "taken a step in the right direction" while also expressing concern that the remaining tariffs imposed by the US on China were too high, posing a danger of being flooded with cheap goods resold from the American market. At the same time, the EU's own tariff negotiations with the US were not going smoothly.

Dombrovskis made this comment to reporters after the meeting of EU finance ministers on Tuesday. He said, "Obviously, the trade tensions between China and the US are easing in the right direction, but it is worth noting that the US still levies quite high tariffs on Chinese goods, which will correspondingly distort the trade situation." Dombrovskis worried that this still meant that "too many" Chinese goods would choose Europe as an alternative export destination.

However, Dombrovskis finally stated, "The easing of the Sino-US trade dispute may alleviate our concerns about trade diversion to some extent."

European Commission Executive Vice-President and Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis (Valdis Dombrovskis) Financial Media Union

Since US President Trump announced the so-called "reciprocal tariff" policy in early April, Europe has been shocked by the economic policies of the Trump administration and worried about the massive impact of reselling Chinese goods from the American market onto Europe.

On April 8, Reuters reported that European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen urged China to resolve problems caused by the US "reciprocal tariff" through negotiations. The office of von der Leyen's office stated that she discussed establishing a mechanism to track possible trade diversion caused by tariffs during her phone conversation with the Chinese side, as the EU was concerned that China might shift its "cheap export goods" target market from the US to Europe.

In addition, the fact that the Sino-US economic and trade talks achieved results itself shocked and embarrassed Europe. The EU was one of the first economies to initiate negotiations with the US after Trump announced the "reciprocal tariff," and the US-EU trade negotiation delegations have held three meetings. The EU even promised to work together with the US to deal with China's so-called "excess capacity," but the relevant discussions yielded little result.

American political news website Politico EU reported on May 12 that although photos showed smiles on the faces of officials from China, the US, and Europe, European officials were already very frustrated with the negotiations. They believed that the US lacked clear negotiation goals and was just making up stories at random. Some EU officials candidly admitted, "Reaching an agreement may take several more weeks because the US seems to have changed its focus multiple times."

After reaching certain consensus with China, Trump immediately turned his gun on the EU, accusing the EU of being "very unfair" to the US and pressuring the EU to make "major concessions," stating that the US "holds all the cards." This added insult to injury for Europe.

Senior Atlantic Council think tank official Josh Lipsky also stated, "On the US priority list, countries like India, Japan, and even Vietnam rank higher than the EU."

This article is an exclusive contribution from Observer Network and cannot be reproduced without permission.

Original source: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7504148415891243539/

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author. You can show your attitude by voting "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" below.