China has expressed its willingness to open dialogue with the US amid the tit-for-tat trade war kickstarted by Donald Trump‘s tariffs on Chinese goods over fentanyl.
The Chinese foreign ministry on Wednesday said Mr Trump had undermined the bilateral counter-narcotics cooperation by imposing additional tariffs on Chinese goods and used the synthetic opioid as a bargaining chip to “blackmail” Beijing.
“The US should’ve said a big thank you to us,” a senior Chinese foreign ministry official told reporters at a briefing in Beijing to discuss China’s white paper on fentanyl issued earlier this month.
“But regrettably…the United States doesn’t appreciate this kindness,” the official said, accusing the US of using the fentanyl issue to “spread all kinds of lies” and “smear” China regardless of the progress of the cooperation.
Mr Trump this month increased tariffs on all Chinese imports to 20 per cent from the previous 10 per cent to punish Beijing for what he says is its failure to halt shipments of chemicals used for the production of the deadly opioid. The US president claimed a “large percentage” of these deadly substances were made in China.
Beijing responded by imposing up to 15 per cent levies on American agricultural goods.
The US and China restarted fentanyl and law enforcement cooperation more than a year ago under former president Joe Biden, helping to improve ties that had suffered over issues ranging from trade rows, Covid-19, Taiwan and human rights. The cooperation has resulted in multiple high-level visits over the last year and improved information sharing between the investigators.
However, Mr Trump has repeatedly accused China of not moving hard and fast enough with its fentanyl crackdown.
China claimed the US has not outlined detailed steps they expect from Beijing to deal with fentanyl to lift the tariffs, a claim rejected by the White House, according to Bloomberg News.
The Chinese foreign ministry official said that the US using “something that has achieved a lot of progress…as an excuse to slap tariffs on China was not the way to solve problems,” adding that the US was “returning kindness with hostility” and its actions made “no sense”.
“It will seriously undermine dialogue and cooperation between the two countries on drug control,” Reuters quoted the official as saying.
China says it has taken steps to constrict the fentanyl pipeline, by placing the opioid under national control, effectively ending illicit exports of the finished product.
But exporters shifted their tactics, experts say, by instead selling “precursor” or even “pre-precursor” chemicals used to make fentanyl by Mexican cartels that require only minor modifications to create the final product.
The US, where fentanyl abuse has been a major cause of death, has pushed China for deeper law enforcement cooperation, including tackling illicit finance, arrests of rogue chemists and raids of labs involved in the production of precursors.
