Lithuania has joined France, Italy, the Netherlands, and Spain in urging the EU to take tougher measures against abusive trade practices by China and other countries, Politico reports. The non-paper noted that some of the EU’s main trading partners were imposing new trade barriers and contributing to industrial overcapacity. The document proposed quicker and easier ways to impose higher tariffs on imports and fight circumvention, Financial Times reported. The French-led group called on the EU to open investigations into unfair trade practices more frequently and bring breaches of trade rules before the World Trade Organization. The five countries called on the European Commission to make more use of its safeguards tool, which can be triggered quickly by a surge in imports, and to create a new “resilience tool” for imposing quotas or additional duties when European supply sources are concentrated beyond a certain threshold. Also, the group called for adding “economic security” to criteria for EU trade investigations and applying anti-subsidy duties to companies directly.
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