Putin: World needs trade peace, not war
Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Friday that the world could be heading for an unprecedented economic crisis due to the confrontational trade policy and protectionism being pursued by the United States.
Without directly naming US President Donald Trump, who has slapped on tariffs and pulled out of trade deals, Putin lamented that a new era of protectionism was emerging and “breaking” the free trade system responsible for global prosperity.
“Today we need not trade wars or even trade truces, but trade peace,” Putin told an economic summit in Saint Petersburg, also attended by Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and French President Emmanuel Macron.
Global trade rules “should be clear and the same for all”.
But “breaking the rules is becoming the rule,” Putin said in another apparent jab at Trump, who has abandoned a Pacific free trade deal and forced a renegotiation of the US pact with Canada and Mexico.
The Kremlin leader said that a combination of sanctions, trade barriers and a lack of trust was hugely dangerous and “could lead to a systemic crisis the likes of which the world has not seen before.”
Putin also appeared to take a poke at the United States justifying tariffs on steel, aluminium and cars using national security concerns.
“Today we are talking about a new type of protectionism, about
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the use of clear pretexts of protecting national security. For what? To pressure competitors or wringing out concessions,” said Putin.
“This could knock the world economy far back to the epoch of subsistence farming,” he added.
IMF chief Christine Lagarde, who spoke at the forum, also warned of the “determination of some to rock the system that has presided over trade relationships”.
She said it would be a “great mistake to resort to protectionism and unilateralism.”
Putin has a clear interest in currying the support of other nations burned by US trade barriers, or its renewed sanctions on Iran that apply to companies worldwide, as it needs additional foreign investment and access to markets. Europe and Russia have criticised the US withdrawal from the Iran deal, which Tehran has respected, and the European Union has indicated it will seek to protect its firms with investments in Iran from the US sanctions. Trump justified abandoning the deal by saying his predecessor Barack Obama negotiated a bad deal.