President Trump said an important trade agreement with China still existed after a White House aide suggested it would be canceled.
“The China Trade Agreement is fully intact. Hopefully they will continue to fulfill the terms of the Agreement! “Trump write on Twitter Monday night.
The tweet came after White House trade adviser Peter Navarro was mentioned in Fox News interview that the phase one trade pact has “ended,” citing fears of how China is handling a coronavirus outbreak that has grown into a global pandemic.
The comments caused Wall Street futures to decline, but they recovered after Navarro returned them. He said the statement was “taken wildly out of context” and had nothing to do with a trade agreement, which had survived rising tensions between Washington and Beijing.
“I’m only talking about the lack of trust we have now about the Chinese Communist Party after they lied about the origin of the Chinese virus and conjured up a pandemic towards the world,” Navarro, director of trade and manufacturing policy at the White House, said in a statement.
After Navarro made a list of US complaints against China, Fox’s host Martha MacCallum said Trump “really wants to stay in this trade deal.” He then asked, “But given everything that happened and all the things you just listed, is it over?”
“It’s over, yes,” said Navarro, adding that China signed a trade pact on January 15 “two full months after they learned that the virus had come out and was there.”
US and Chinese officials have promised to implement the trade agreement even when the Trump government accuses China of trying to cover up the coronavirus outbreak. China denies making mistakes.
US trade representative Robert Lighthizer said last week that he expected Beijing to fulfill its purchase commitments under the pact even though the pandemic had rocked its economy.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian criticized Navarro on Tuesday, saying he “consistently lied and lacked honesty and trust.”
“China’s attitude on this issue is consistent and clear,” Zhao said of the trade agreement.
With Post cable
