HANOI: The United States has told Vietnam its trade deficit with the Southeast Asian country is “unsustainable” and a major concern, Vietnamese state media reported on Friday (May 16), as the two countries hold negotiations on tariffs.
Vietnam has been holding talks with the US, its largest export market, to persuade US President Donald Trump’s administration to take a benign view of its huge trade surplus with America, after Trump in April announced a “reciprocal” tariff rate of 46 per cent on Vietnamese goods, to take effect in July.
Robert Kaproth, a senior US Treasury official, said in a Thursday meeting with Vietnam’s deputy finance minister Cao Anh Tuan that the country must take measures to combat illegal transhipment and other kinds of trade fraud, Vietnam News Agency reported on Friday.
Tuan asked Kaproth to help facilitate Vietnam’s imports of American high-tech products, as part of their efforts to narrow the trade deficit, which exceeded US$123 billion last year.
“Vietnam has demand for products that are strengths of the US in the fields of energy, high technology, aviation, machinery and equipment, and agricultural products,” Tuan said, according to the report.
The US Treasury did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.
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