The European Union expects to be excluded from US steel and aluminium tariffs but will go to the World Trade Organisation to impose its own measures if Washington presses ahead, the EU's trade chief says.
President Donald Trump set import tariffs on Thursday of 25 per cent on steel and 10 per cent on aluminium but exempted Canada and Mexico and offered the possibility of excluding other allies, backtracking from an earlier stance.
EU Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom, who co-ordinates policy for the world's biggest trading bloc, said she shared US concerns about overcapacity in the steel sector but did not believe in tariffs as a way to solve the problem.
"Europe is certainly not a threat to American internal security so we expect to be excluded," Malmstrom told reporters on Friday before speaking at a conference in Brussels.
Asked at the conference whether she was ready to react if the 28-country EU was included in the US tariffs, Malmstrom said she stood ready to go to the WTO, the international trade arbiter, to impose the bloc's own safeguards within 90 days.
"We have been very clear that (the US decision) is not in compliance with the WTO, so we will go to the WTO, possibly with some other friends. We will have to protect our industry with rebalancing measures, safeguards," she said.
European industry associations called on Malmstrom to respond if the EU was subjected to the tariffs, saying they would hit the steel and aluminium sectors hard.
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