US Treasury chief to talk with Chinese vice premier on trade issues

​​​​​​​ISTANBUL

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent will have a call Friday with China's Vice Premier He Lifeng to discuss trade issues between the top two economies, a senior Trump administration official told the CNBC television network.

It was not immediately clear what other information would be addressed during the call, such as the precise time or follow-up steps that would be discussed.

But the discussion may be a sign of improvement in the US-China trade relations, which had a rough week after US President Donald Trump threatened to impose an additional 100% tariff on Chinese imports in response to Beijing's new export restrictions.

On Oct. 10, China expanded its rare earth export restrictions to include the military use of the minerals, the first time it had taken the measure.

After Trump threatened to impose the 100% tariffs, he later hinted that he would not carry out his pledge to impose a "massive increase of tariffs" on China, saying, "Don’t worry about China, it will all be fine!"

But Trump said Tuesday that China's choosing not to buy US soybeans was "an economically hostile act."

"We are considering terminating business with China having to do with Cooking Oil, and other elements of Trade, as retribution," he wrote on his Truth Social platform. "As an example, we can easily produce Cooking Oil ourselves, we don’t need to purchase it from China."

On Thursday, when asked in a Fox Business interview if the threatened 100% tariff could be sustained, Trump said: “It’s not sustainable, but that’s what the number is.”

“It’s probably not, you know, it could stand, but they forced me to do that,” Trump said. “I think we’re going to do fine with China.”