China President Is Eager To Finalize Trade Deal

China’s President Xi Jinping said on Friday that the country wants to finalize the phase one of the trade deal with the U.S. and has been trying to avoid the trade war from the beginning, Reuters reported.

What Happened

“We want to work for a phase one agreement on the basis of mutual respect and equality,” Xi said at an event organized by Bloomberg LP in Beijing, according to Reuters.

But Xi mentioned that, if cornered, China won’t hesitate to push back.

“When necessary we will fight back, but we have been working actively to try not to have a trade war. We did not initiate this trade war and this is not something we want.”

Trade Deal Unlikely To Happen This Year

The phase one of the trade deal, which the leaders of the world’s two largest economies were expected to sign in November, has been delayed.

The two countries are struggling to come to an agreement over the trade of farm products and China’s intellectual property laws, among other concerns, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Sources from the White House told Reuters that a deal is unlikely to come by the end of this year. According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Myron Brilliant, the two countries could reach an agreement in a “few weeks.”

The trade deal is unlikely to come by at least until the Dec. 15 deadline for reconsidering tariffs on Chinese imports, Brilliant, who is also the chief trade negotiator for China, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Friday.

“We’re going to have just a few weeks now, and I’m not sure we’re going to get a deal done by Dec. 15. I hope so, I want to continue to emphasize there is an opportunity here between now and then, but we need more than Dec. 15 suspended,” Brilliant said.

Photo credit: Presidential Press and Information Office of Kremlin via Wikimedia