Hong Kong will file a complaint against newly imposed US tariffs to the World Trade Organisation, a city official said a day after China's retaliatory levies on American goods came into effect.
Hong Kong chief secretary Eric Chan said on Tuesday the financial hub will file a complaint with the trade body over the US “completely ignoring” the city's status as a separate customs territory.
America and China launched into a trade war last week after Donald Trump imposed a 10 per cent tariff on Chinese goods and Beijing responded with levies on US products.
China's 15 per cent tariff on coal and liquefied natural gas as well as a 10 per cent levy on oil and agricultural equipment came into effect on Monday.
Beijing has already filed a complaint with the WTO arguing that the American tariffs were a "serious violation of international rule".
Mr Chan claimed that the American tariffs were "absolutely inconsistent with the WTO rules". "Of ours, they have totally disregarded Hong Kong is a separate customs territory," he said.
"We will file a complaint to the WTO regarding this unreasonable arrangement," he said without providing a timeline. "All I can say is the policies are mercurial.”
The former British colony enjoys a unique status as a separate customs territory within China under the "one country, two systems" principle, which is meant to allow the region a higher degree of autonomy. However, Beijing's imposition of sweeping national security law on Hong Kong in 2020 and a massive crackdown on dissent prompted the US to end the city's special status, escalating tensions between China.
Subsequently, the first Trump administration stipulated that goods made in Hong Kong for export to the US needed to be labelled as made in China, ending one of Hong Kong's longstanding competitive advantages as a trading hub.
The US Postal Service last week suspended all inbound mail and packages from China and Hong Kong, then reversed that decision soon afterward. The move to stop accepting parcels from China and Hong Kong had caused chaos and confusion among retailers and express shipping firms over how to deal with the US tariffs.
Mr Trump's latest move also included closing the "de minimis" duty exemption for packages valued at under $800 (£648), apparently targeted at stopping the flow of precursor chemicals for the production of fentanyl opioids in the US. Such packages are widely used by e-commerce firms including Shein, Temu and Amazon.
In its complaint to the WTO, Beijing accused the US of making "unfounded and false allegations" about China’s role in the flow of fentanyl to the US to justify the tariffs. It added that the measures were "discriminatory and protectionist" and thus violated trade rules.
China's request for WTO consultation launched a dispute process that could result in a ruling that Mr Trump's duties violated trade rules in the same manner that a 2020 ruling by the global trade body found that his first-term China tariffs broke trade regulations.
Such a victory would be unlikely to bring Beijing much relief as the WTO Appellate Body has been largely inoperable for years because Washington has blocked the appointment of judges over what it views as judicial overreach by the organisation. This has prevented a final decision in the 2020 case.
