Having spoken on behalf of the 28 EU member states on Thursday 28 May, European Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmström confirmed the same day that a letter had been sent to the administration of US President Donald Trump underlining the European bloc's concerns about the measure adopted by Washington to remedy the US trade deficit with European countries.
"We are concerned by certain measures coming from the US administration. Individual member states are concerned and we (Ed: the Commission) are concerned as well. The Commission has submitted a response on behalf of the 28 countries where we emphasise that the EU has one single trade policy, and divergent trade deficit in one individual cannot be originated in trade policy measures", Malmström told press after the meeting of EU trade ministers on Thursday.
"We understand that the US wants to look at this, but we feel very strongly that deficit is not an accurate metric only to evaluate the consequences of trade or openness", she added.
At the end of March, Trump signed two executive orders aiming to examine the causes and countries responsible for the US trade deficit. These executive orders target the partners of the US in the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) – Canada and Mexico – but also China and other industrialised economies, including Germany, France and Italy, for the EU (see EUROPE 11760).
Trump signed another executive order at the end of April on the abuses and violations of trade deals, calling on his administration to start examining all trade agreements signed by the US and the consequences of his country belonging to the WTO, in order to determine the causes of the US trade deficit with other countries (see EUROPE 11782). (Original version in French by Emmanuel Hagry)