BEIJING - A week after an official Chinese newspaper ran a four-page ad in a U.S. daily touting the mutual benefits of U.S.-China trade, the U.S. ambassador to China accused Beijing of using the American press to spread propaganda.
U.S. President Donald Trump last Wednesday referred to the China Daily’s paid supplement in the Des Moines Register - the state of Iowa’s biggest selling newspaper - after accusing China of seeking to meddle in the Nov. 6 U.S. congressional elections, a charge China denies.
Trump’s accusation that Beijing was trying to meddle in U.S. elections marked what U.S. officials told Reuters was a new phase in an escalating campaign by Washington to put pressure on China.
While it is normal for foreign governments to place advertisements to promote trade, Beijing and Washington are currently locked in an escalating trade war that has seen them level rounds of tariffs on each other’s imports.
China’s retaliatory tariffs early in the trade war were designed to hit exporters in states such as Iowa that supported Trump’s Republican Party, Chinese and U.S. experts have said. (Reuters)