EoW September 2012

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Transatlantic cable
of Charlotte Douglas International Airport, which has about
$1 billion in improvements in the works. This bracing
realisation is nding belated but fervid expression all across the
United States.
Steel
The World Trade Organization nds
that Chinese duties on American
high-tech steel violatedWTO rules
In a key victory for the administration of President Barack
Obama, a World Trade Organization panel ruled that China
violated global trade rules by imposing duties on a speciality
steel product imported from the United States. The decision,
announced on 15th June, supports objections raised by the
US to Chinese countervailing duties on electrical steel that is
produced mainly in two presidential battleground states: Ohio
and Pennsylvania. It enables Mr Obama, a Democrat, to argue
that his trade policies on China are yielding results as he vies
with his Republican challenger Mitt Romney in the run-up to the
November election.
The case involved Chinese duties on potentially hundreds of
millions of dollars worth of grain-oriented at-rolled electrical
steel made by AK Steel Corp (West Chester, Ohio) and ATI
Allegheny Ludlum (Pittsburgh) for use in the power sector.
The WTO found that China launched an investigation into US
subsidies on the steel on insu cient evidence, and ignored
certain facts in making the determination whether the product
was in fact being dumped in China. A peculiarity of the case
was China’s complaint that the steel was being sold at unfairly
cheap prices in its own market. China, the producer of almost
half the world’s steel, is often accused of this behaviour in the
United States, which has imposed punitive duties on Chinese
steel imports. As recently as May, Beijing had made those US
duties the basis of a separate trade complaint at the WTO. While
both countries deny that they are engaged in a trade war, the
tensions generated in these matters are undeniable. Typically,
China hotly rejects American criticisms of its policies, whereupon
the US faults China’s “apparently retaliatory conduct.”
Tim Reif, general counsel in the US Trade Representative’s
o ce, reprised this theme when the WTO panel’s judgment was
announced, telling reporters in Washington that the disallowed
duties appeared to be part of a “disturbing trend of China using
its trade remedy laws without justi cation.”
But Mr Reif did not leave it at that. He warned that Washington
could bring another case at the WTO if China goes after more US
products in retaliation for duties the United States has imposed
on Chinese solar panels and wind turbines. “We are watching
those actions like a hawk,” said the trade o cial.
† China imposed the punitive duties after its top silicon
steel producers, Baosteel Group and Wuhan Iron and Steel
Group, complained about imports from the United States
and Russia, which is not a WTO member and was not
involved in the case. The Chinese steel giants objected to
the “Buy America” provisions of the American Recovery and
Reinvestment Act of 2009 and the procurement laws of
some state governments.
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