The United States launched a probe into China’s shipping industry – Copyright AFP -STR<\/p>\n
China imposed sanctions on five American subsidiaries of South Korean shipbuilder Hanwha Ocean on Tuesday, accusing them of supporting a US government investigation into the shipping industry, as tit-for-tat port fees took effect.<\/p>\n
The United States announced in April it would begin applying fees to all arriving Chinese-built and operated ships after a \u201cSection 301\u201d investigation found Beijing\u2019s dominance in the industry was unreasonable.<\/p>\n
Beijing responded last week by announcing \u201cspecial port fees\u201d on US ships arriving at Chinese ports. Fees on both sides kicked in Tuesday.<\/p>\n
The sanctioned subsidiaries are Hanwha Shipping LLC, Hanwha Philly Shipyard Inc., Hanwha Ocean USA International LLC, Hanwha Shipping Holdings LLC and HS USA Holdings Corp.<\/p>\n
The United States\u2019 investigation and subsequent measures \u201cseverely damage\u00a0the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese enterprises\u201d, Beijing\u2019s commerce ministry said in a statement.<\/p>\n
The Hanwha subsidiaries \u201cassisted and supported the relevant investigation activities of the US government, endangering China\u2019s sovereignty, security and development interests\u201d, it said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Organisations and individuals in China are now banned from cooperating with them.<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u2018Unfair competition\u2019 \u2013\u00a0<\/p>\n
Separately on Tuesday, China\u2019s Ministry of Transport opened a probe into whether the US Section 301 investigation impacted the \u201csecurity and development interests\u201d of China\u2019s shipbuilding industry and supply chain.<\/p>\n
The ministry said it would consider whether enterprises or individuals had supported the investigation, raising the prospect that more US-linked firms could face restrictions.<\/p>\n
Washington has said its port fees are to address Chinese dominance of the global shipping sector and provide an incentive for building more ships in the United States.<\/p>\n
The industry is now dominated by Asia, with China building nearly half of all ships launched, ahead of South Korea and Japan.<\/p>\n
Hanwha, one of South Korea\u2019s largest shipbuilders, announced $5 billion investment in Philly Shipyard, in the US city of Philadelphia, in August.<\/p>\n
China\u2019s commerce ministry called the US measures \u201ctypical unilateralist and protectionist actions\u201d that constituted \u201cunfair competition\u201d, in another statement on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cChina urges the US to correct its wrongful practices, work together with China in the same direction and resolve issues of mutual concern through equal dialogue and consultation,\u201d it said.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The United States launched a probe into China’s shipping industry – Copyright AFP -STR China imposed sanctions on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":223866,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,144,3,12795,125682,447,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":{"0":"post-223865","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-china","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-ports","12":"tag-skorea","13":"tag-trade","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-united-states-of-america","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","18":"tag-us","19":"tag-usa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=223865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223865\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/223866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=223865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=223865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=223865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}