G7: US-Japan ‘close’ to trade deal, too early to reintegrate Russia
US PRESIDENT Donald Trump on Sunday said the US and Japan are “very close” to a major bilateral trade deal.
Speaking shortly before holding talks with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on the sidelines of the G7 summit in Biarritz, France, Trump said the US is “very close to a major deal with Japan”.
The two sides have “been working on it for five months”, he told reporters at the start of a separate meeting held with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
“It’s a very big deal. It will be one of the biggest deals we’ve ever made with Japan,” Trump said.
Earlier, Japan’s minister in charge of trade talks with the US, Toshimitsu Motegi, reported “great progress”.
“This progress will be confirmed at the” Trump-Abe meeting, he said.
The two leaders enjoy close ties but the US president has frequently claimed that Tokyo has an unfair advantage in bilateral trade.
Negotiators have agreed Japan will place tarif fs on US agricultura l products up to levels that apply to members of t he Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) pact, Japan’s public broadcaster NHK and major Japanese nationa l dailies reported.
Both sides agreed that Japan will cut tariffs on US beef and pork to the TPP levels, but will not set new quotas for butter and skim milk, NHK said, citing unnamed sources.
Japan has repeatedly said the extent of the opening up of its agricultural market would be within the concession it had made to members of the TPP pact.
After an abrupt US withdrawal from the TPP, 11 coun
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tries circling the Pacific last year signed a slimmed-down version of the trade deal, and the pact has been championed as an antidote to growing US protectionism under Trump.
The US president has since sparked fears of a trade war by levying steep tariffs and denouncing unfair trading practices.
The US will eliminate levies on a wide range of Japanese industrial products, but its tariffs on Japanese automobiles will be left for further negotiations as Trump sees the US trade deficit with Japan as a problem, NHK said.
Both sides hope to reach the final agreement by late September, reports in Japan said.
Strengthening Russia ties
Meanwhile, G7 leaders reportedly backed strengthening cooperation with Russia after its expulsion from the group in 2014 but believe it is too early to reintegrate Moscow and return to a G8, diplomatic sources said on Sunday.
“The leaders of the G7 are
in favour of reinforcing coordination with Russia on current crises [but] . . . it is too early for reintegration,” said a diplomatic source, who asked not to be named.
Russia was thrown out of what was the G8 in 2014 after it seized Ukraine’s Black Sea peninsula of Crimea, an annexation never recognised by the international community.
The G7 now brings together Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Ita ly, Japan, and the US. The source added the seven leaders agreed the position on Russia during t he summit’s opening dinner late on Saturday.
Trump, who will host next year’s 2020 summit, has floated the possibility of Russia being allowed back in.
Asked on Sunday about inviting Russia to next year’s G7, he responded: “That I don’t know. It’s certainly possible.”
G7 leaders had also mandated French President Emmanuel Macron to send a message to Iran as tensions rise over its nuclear programme, the source said.
“Emmanuel Macron was mandated to talk with Iran and address a message” to the country to avoid an escalation in the region, said the source.
Macron on Friday met in Paris with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and has also held telephone talks with President Hassan Rouhani.
Trump also denied on Sunday that his trade war with China is causing friction at the G7 summit, but indicated he will hold off from a threatened further escalation for now.
“I think they respect the trade war. It has to happen,” Trump told reporters in Biarritz.
Asked if the other leaders had criticised the massive trade struggle, he said “no, not at all. I haven’t heard that”.
In fact, European members of the G7, which includes Britain, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, Japan and the US, have repeatedly expressed concern over the trade war’s threat to the wider global economy.