Trump says China has 'totally violated' agreement with US on tariffs

US President Donald Trump on Friday said China had violated an agreement on tariffs with the United States.

"China, perhaps not surprisingly to some, HAS TOTALLY VIOLATED ITS AGREEMENT WITH US. So much for being Mr. NICE GUY!," Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform.

US trade talks with China were "a bit stalled" and getting a deal over the finish line will likely need the direct involvement of President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News on Thursday.

Two weeks after breakthrough negotiations that resulted in a temporary truce in the trade war between the world’s two biggest economies, Bessent said progress since then has been slow, but said he expects more talks in the next few weeks.

The US-China agreement to dial back triple-digit tariffs for 90 days prompted a massive relief rally in global stocks. But it did nothing to address the underlying reasons for Trump’s tariffs on Chinese goods, mainly longstanding US complaints about China's state-dominated, export-driven economic model, leaving those issues for future talks.

Earlier this month, the United States and China slashed high tariffs on each other’s good for 90 days in a deal occur between them in Geneva.

Under the deal, the United States agreed to lower its tariffs on Chinese goods to 30% while China will reduce its own to 10% — down by over 100% points.

The reductions came as a major de-escalation in trade tensions that saw US tariffs on Chinese imports soar up to 145% and even as high as 245% on some products.

At that time, analysts also warned that the possibility of tariffs coming back into force after 90 days simply piles on more uncertainty.

"Further tariff reductions will be difficult and the risk of renewed escalation persists," Yue Su, Principal Economist at The Economist Intelligence Unit, told AFP.

Trump's rollercoaster tariff row with Beijing has wreaked havoc on US companies that rely on Chinese manufacturing, with a temporary de-escalation only expected to partially calm the storm.

And Beijing officials have admitted that China's economy, already ailing from a protracted property crisis and sluggish consumer spending, is likewise being affected by the trade uncertainty.

With additional input from AFP