As the trade war between the world’s two largest economies intensifies, China has warned other nations against forging trade deals with the United States that could come at its expense, signaling a tougher stance in its economic rivalry with Washington.
China threatened to take “resolute and reciprocal” countermeasures against other countries negotiating with the US if they make a deal at China’s expense.
This came as China’s commerce ministry’s response to recent news reports that US President, Donald Trump planned to pressure other countries to limit their trade with China in return for tariff exemptions.
Beijing and the US are locked in an escalating trade war, running separately to the US’s efforts to rewrite trade deals with the rest of the world.
Tit-for-tat tariffs between the US and China have reached 145% on Chinese exports to the US and 125% on US exports to China. Trump’s tariffs on China are the highest of the global tariffs he announced for all US trading partners as part of his so-called “liberation day” campaign to make trading relationships more favourable to the US and bring more manufacturing on to US soil.
This month, as the US appeared destined for a recession, Trump announced a 90-day pause of the higher tariffs, reducing all countries to a blanket 10% – except China.
Some countries are engaged in negotiations with the US to lower or remove tariffs before the 90-day deadline.
Reporting in the last week has suggested that Trump’s team intends to use those negotiations for its trade war with China.
The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg have both cited US official saying the US was preparing to pressure those nations to curb their own trade with China or impose monetary sanctions.
To this, China’s commerce ministry stated that the United States has abused tariffs on all trading partners under the banner of so-called “equivalence”, while also forcing all parties to start so-called “reciprocal tariffs” negotiations with them. “China firmly opposes any party reaching a deal at the expense of China’s interests,” the ministry said.
“Appeasement will not bring peace, and compromise will not be respected … To seek one’s own temporary selfish interests at the expense of others’ interests is to seek the skin of a tiger.”
China’s commerce ministry
That approach, it warned, “will ultimately fail on both ends and harm others.”
The ministry asserted that China is determined and capable of safeguarding its own rights and interests and is willing to strengthen solidarity with all parties.
China Seeks Equal Footing
Moreover, the Commerce Ministry said that China respects all parties resolving economic and trade differences with the United States through consultation on an equal footing.
Bo Zhengyuan, partner at China-based policy consultancy Plenum, said, “The fact is, nobody wants to pick a side.”
“If countries have high reliance on China in terms of investment, industrial infrastructure, technology know-how and consumption, I don’t think they’ll be buying into U.S. demands. Many Southeast Asian countries belong to this category.”
Bo Zhengyuan
The stakes are high for Southeast Asian nations caught in the crossfire of the Sino-U.S. tariff war, particularly given the regional ASEAN bloc’s huge two-way trade with both China and the United States.
ASEAN is China’s largest trading partner, with total trade value reaching $234 billion in the first quarter of 2025 and accounting for over 16% of China’s overall foreign trade, China’s customs agency said last week.
Trade between ASEAN and the US totaled around $476.8 billion in 2024, according to US figures, making Washington the regional bloc’s fourth-largest trading partner.
Pursuing a hardline stance, Beijing will this week convene an informal United Nations Security Council meeting to accuse Washington of bullying and “casting a shadow over the global efforts for peace and development” by weaponizing tariffs.
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