https://archive.is/FKuhi (reuters)
https://archive.is/MIdNc (afp)
Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng met for about eight hours with U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer in Geneva in their first face-to-face meeting since the world’s two largest economies heaped tariffs well above 100% on each other’s goods.
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday that an 80% tariff on Chinese goods “seems right”, suggesting for the first time a specific alternative to the 145% levies he has imposed on Chinese imports.
Neither side made any statements about the substance of the discussions nor signaled any progress towards reducing crushing tariffs as meetings at the residence of Switzerland’s ambassador to the U.N. concluded at about 8 p.m. local time. (1800 GMT)
The discussions are expected to restart on Sunday in the Swiss city, according to an individual familiar with the talks, who was not authorized to speak publicly.
The 80% number is just something that Trump posted on his social media early on Friday morning, before any meeting ever happened.
UPDATE Trump posted on truthsocial, 1 hour ago. He describes the meeting with the phrases “total reset” and “great progress”. I won’t believe this until I hear the perspective from China’s government.
The PRC does not suddenly become a liberal country because it has some advisors who studied in the US or worked for the WTO, nor do the excesses and missteps of the wild 90s negate the socialist character of the CPC. The claim that the PRC is now a liberal country, and abandoned Marxism, because it became a member of the WTO, is equally ignorant. The PRC did not join the WTO because it “became liberal”, it did so because its one of the larger international trade orgs, and the PRC’s socialist market economy tends to do a lot of world trade.
Cuba and Vietnam are also both WTO members. Are they also liberal countries now too?
I apologize if I unduly called you an ultraleft, but this one drop of blood fallacy you’re committing here is typical of ultraleft critiques of AES states. “You’re a member of the WTO? You must have abandoned Marxism!”