US President Donald Trump says he does not expect much progress from trade talks with China this week in Washington.
Trump said in an interview with Reuters on Monday he had "no time frame" for ending the trade dispute with China, which threatens to impose tariffs on virtually all goods traded between the world's two largest economies.
"I'm like them; I have a long horizon," he added.
The talks this week come as new US tariffs on $US16 billion of Chinese goods take effect on Thursday, along with retaliatory tariffs from Beijing on an equal amount of US goods.
The US Trade Representative's Office also is holding hearings this week on proposals for tariffs on a further $US200 billion of Chinese goods that will start to directly hit consumer products.
Trump said Chinese negotiators would be arriving shortly, adding he did not "anticipate much" from the mid-level discussions.
He said resolving the trade dispute with China will "take time because China's done too well for too long, and they've become spoiled. They dealt with people that, frankly, didn't know what they were doing, to allow us to get into this position."
Trump also accused China of manipulating its yuan currency to make up for having to pay tariffs imposed by Washington, while arguing the US central bank should be more accommodating.
The meetings, expected to take place on Wednesday and Thursday in Washington, are the first formal US-China trade talks since June, when US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross met Chinese economic adviser Liu He in Beijing but returned with no agreements.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lu Kang, asked about Trump's comments at a regular news briefing in Beijing, reiterated that China hoped the talks could reach a "good result".
"We hope that both sides can sit down quietly and steadily, and dedicate themselves to getting a good result on the basis of equality, parity and trust," Lu said.
The Washington talks will be led by US Treasury Undersecretary David Malpass and Chinese Vice Minister of Commerce Wang Shouwen.
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