EoW September 2012

Transatlantic cable

certain facts in making the determination whether the product was in fact being dumped in China. A peculiarity of the case was China’s complaint that the steel was being sold at unfairly cheap prices in its own market. China, the producer of almost half the world’s steel, is often accused of this behaviour in the United States, which has imposed punitive duties on Chinese steel imports. As recently as May, Beijing had made those US duties the basis of a separate trade complaint at the WTO. While both countries deny that they are engaged in a trade war, the tensions generated in these matters are undeniable. Typically, China hotly rejects American criticisms of its policies, whereupon the US faults China’s “apparently retaliatory conduct.” Tim Reif, general counsel in the US Trade Representative’s o ce, reprised this theme when the WTO panel’s judgment was announced, telling reporters in Washington that the disallowed duties appeared to be part of a “disturbing trend of China using its trade remedy laws without justi cation.” But Mr Reif did not leave it at that. He warned that Washington could bring another case at the WTO if China goes after more US products in retaliation for duties the United States has imposed on Chinese solar panels and wind turbines. “We are watching those actions like a hawk,” said the trade o cial. † China imposed the punitive duties after its top silicon steel producers, Baosteel Group and Wuhan Iron and Steel Group, complained about imports from the United States and Russia, which is not a WTO member and was not involved in the case. The Chinese steel giants objected to the “Buy America” provisions of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and the procurement laws of some state governments.

of Charlotte Douglas International Airport, which has about $1 billion in improvements in the works. This bracing realisation is nding belated but fervid expression all across the United States.

Steel

The World Trade Organization nds that Chinese duties on American high-tech steel violatedWTO rules

In a key victory for the administration of President Barack Obama, a World Trade Organization panel ruled that China violated global trade rules by imposing duties on a speciality steel product imported from the United States. The decision, announced on 15 th June, supports objections raised by the US to Chinese countervailing duties on electrical steel that is produced mainly in two presidential battleground states: Ohio and Pennsylvania. It enables Mr Obama, a Democrat, to argue that his trade policies on China are yielding results as he vies with his Republican challenger Mitt Romney in the run-up to the November election. The case involved Chinese duties on potentially hundreds of millions of dollars worth of grain-oriented at-rolled electrical steel made by AK Steel Corp (West Chester, Ohio) and ATI Allegheny Ludlum (Pittsburgh) for use in the power sector. The WTO found that China launched an investigation into US subsidies on the steel on insu cient evidence, and ignored

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