BRUSSELS, Sept. 18 (Xinhua) -- America's newly announced tariffs against China "is not a progress," said Bernard Dewit, chairman of the Belgian-Chinese Economic and Commercial Council, on Tuesday.
"It is not only against China, but also against many other countries, Europeans and emerging markets," he said in an interview with Xinhua.
Disregarding overwhelming international and domestic opposition, the United States decided to impose additional 10-percent tariffs on 200 billion U.S. dollars worth of Chinese products from Sept. 24 and will take other escalating tariff measures.
"We see also that some of our (European) imports in the U.S. are also taxed, so I think it is not a progress," said Dewit.
Running against U.S. President Donald Trump's stated goal by raising tariffs, the United States recently posted 50.1 billion U.S. dollars of trade deficit in goods and services in July, the highest level since February.
"I think if everyone puts border, we will all lose, and so I really hope that first of all some negotiations will be held between the U.S. and China, and that they will find a solution," said the chief of the Belgian-Chinese business association.
"I remember also that when China applied to go to WTO (World Trade Organization), China was told by the Western world, the U.S. and the Europeans, that they had to make more effort to suppress trade barriers, to open more the economy, what I see now is that on the contrary: the U.S. is now putting barriers," he said.
As a response, China said Tuesday it will add additional tariffs on U.S. products worth 60 billion dollars starting from Sept. 24.
The willful decision of the U.S. government has led to the escalation of trade friction between the two countries. China was forced to take countermeasures to defend free trade and multilateral system, and its own legitimate rights and interests, China's Customs Tariff Commission of the State Council said in a statement.
China hopes the U.S. side will stop frictions from expanding and jointly safeguard bilateral trade ties with China through equal, honest and pragmatic dialogue, on the basis of mutual respect and mutual benefits, said the statement.
"I just really hope that the American industry, the American financial services will tell the president, will tell the federal government in the U.S. that it (raising tariffs) is maybe not the right way to go," Dewit said.
