The World Trade Organization (WTO) gave China the go-ahead to impose retaliatory tariffs of around $645 million on US imports, the decision is the result of a decade-old spat over Chinese subsidies aimed at increasing exports of items such as solar panels and steel pipes, reports The Wall Street Journal.
The ruling was made by a WTO arbitration panel in a case dating back to 2012. China had complained about the tariffs the US had imposed between 2008 and 2012 on solar panels and other products that the US said were produced with unfair subsidies to state-owned companies.
The WTO’s high-level dispute settlement court had delivered a mixed ruling on the fight in 2018, saying the US’s tariffs were in violation of WTO rules. Since then, the two countries argued over the compliance with the ruling and the amount of the compensation China should be allowed to collect in retaliatory tariffs, handing the case to a WTO arbitration panel.