Chinese officials are expected to be in Washington this week to hold consultations with the U.S. ahead of high-level trade talks in October.
State-controlled broadcaster CCTV reported on Tuesday that Vice Minister of the Finance Ministry Liao Min lead a vice-ministerial delegation to discuss trade and economic issues, according to CNBC’s translation.
The meeting comes at the invitation of the United States, CCTV reported.
The timing of the meeting was unclear — the CCTV report said China’s delegation would visit the U.S. on Wednesday, but Reuters cited U.S. trade officials as saying that deputy-level talks would commence Thursday.
The U.S. and China have been engaged in a trade battle for more than a year, slapping retaliatory tariffs on each other’s goods worth billions of dollars.
Tensions escalated last month when both sides announced increased tariffs.
In response to earlier duties, China said on Aug. 23 it would apply new tariffs of between 5% and 10% on $75 billion worth of goods from the United States. President Donald Trump then threatened to increase tariffs on all Chinese products by the end of the year.
Both sides have since made small concessions, with Beijing exempting some U.S. products from additional tariffs.
Out of “good will” and at the request of Beijing, the Trump administration also agreed to delay tariff hikes on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods by two weeks — from Oct. 1 to Oct. 15. The People’s Republic of China will be celebrating its 70th Anniversary on October 1.
