US President Donald Trump on Thursday threatened to impose fresh tariffs on China, according to media reports.
The Washington Post on Thursday had reported that officials have discussed the idea of cancelling the US’ debt to China, as a consequence of their lack of transparency.
The report had been denied by Larry Kudlow, Trump’s top economic adviser. However, when asked about the cancellation of debts and US’ retaliation to China, Trump had told Reuters that he might “do it differently.”
“I can do the same thing, but even for more money, just by putting on tariffs,” Trump had said as per the report.
Trump’s repeated attacks
The statement is an addition to Trump’s repeated attack on China regarding their alleged lack of transparency and mishandling of the novel coronavirus. He also said that he had seen evidence that linked the novel coronavirus outbreak to a Wuhan lab according to an AFP report.
On Wednesday, Trump had said that he believed that China has deliberately mishandled the novel coronavirus to make him lose in the re-election bid in November, Reuters had reported.
In an interview with Reuters, Trump slammed China. In the interview at the Oval Office, he had said that he was looking at different options in terms of consequences for Beijing over the virus.
Earlier this month, the US had urged China to let an intelligence team into the country to probe the origin of the virus. The order was rejected by China claiming that they were “the victim of the virus” as well according to media reports.
Cases surge
US’ repeated attacks on China come at a time when cases in the US have been surging. The US this week became the first country to cross a million reported cases of Covid-19.
The US has reported over 1 million cases with the death toll surpassing 60,000 according to the CDC.
Please Email the Editor