In a CNBC interview yesterday, US Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin talked about some concrete progress in US-China trade negotiations, including the core issue of enforcement.
Mnuchin said: “We’ve pretty much agreed on an enforcement mechanism. We’ve agreed that both sides will establish enforcement offices that will deal with the ongoing matters. This is something both sides are taking very seriously… We are really focused on the execution of the documents.”
Nevertheless he refused to put a timeline of the talks. “We are hopeful we can do this quickly, but we are not going to set an arbitrary deadline,” Mnuchin said. “If we can complete this agreement, this will be the most significant changes to the economic relationship between the U.S. and China in really the last 40 years. The opening of the Chinese economy will be a tremendous opportunity with structural changes that will benefit U.S. workers and U.S. companies.”
Chinese commerce ministry confirmed today that senior trade negotiators from both countries held phone calls earlier this week. Gao Feng, the ministry’s spokesman said “in the next step, both trade teams will keep in close communication, and work at full speed via all sorts of effective channels to proceed with negotiations.”
