{"id":604149,"date":"2026-04-24T18:51:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T18:51:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/604149\/"},"modified":"2026-04-24T18:51:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T18:51:11","slug":"us-and-eu-sign-critical-minerals-plan-in-push-to-loosen-chinas-grip-on-key-materials","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/604149\/","title":{"rendered":"US and EU sign critical minerals plan in push to loosen China\u2019s grip on key materials"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The US and the European Union on Friday deepened their coordination on critical minerals as part of a broader push by Western allies to loosen China\u2019s grip on materials crucial to advanced manufacturing.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and European Union Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic signed a memorandum of understanding for a \u200cpartnership on producing and securing critical minerals.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Rubio did not mention China in his remarks, but said the preliminary agreement with Brussels reflected growing awareness among Western allies of the importance of supply chains and critical minerals for their economic success.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">China has used its chokehold on the processing of many minerals as geoeconomic leverage, at times curbing exports, suppressing prices and undercutting other countries\u2019 ability to diversify sources of the materials used to make semiconductors, electric vehicles and advanced weapons.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cThe overconcentration of these resources, the fact that they\u2019re dominated by \u2060one or two places, is an unacceptable risk. We need diversity in our supply chains,\u201d Rubio said before signing the memorandum.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"US Secretary of State Marco Rubio (right) is joined by EU Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security Maros Sefcovic for a signing ceremony in Washington on Friday. Photo: AP\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1cecaa53-c729-4d36-a62a-876f65f86b5b_f8795b7e.jpg\" title=\"US Secretary of State Marco Rubio (right) is joined by EU Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security Maros Sefcovic for a signing ceremony in Washington on Friday. Photo: AP\"\/>US Secretary of State Marco Rubio (right) is joined by EU Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security Maros Sefcovic for a signing ceremony in Washington on Friday. Photo: AP<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">US Trade Representative Jamieson \u200cGreer, who will meet with Sefcovic separately on Friday, announced a separate action plan to coordinate trade policies on critical minerals to address what they called \u201cthe non-market policies and practices that have distorted critical minerals supply chains\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The US and the European Union on Friday deepened their coordination on critical minerals as part of a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":604150,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,24303,144,5335,3471,26358,26,3,250241,4121,21,19,22,20,25,136875,102851,24,2002],"class_list":{"0":"post-604149","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-brussels","10":"tag-china","11":"tag-european-union","12":"tag-japan","13":"tag-maros-sefcovic","14":"tag-mexico","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-rubio","17":"tag-state-department","18":"tag-united-states","19":"tag-united-states-of-america","20":"tag-unitedstates","21":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","22":"tag-us","23":"tag-us-secretary-of-state","24":"tag-us-trade-representative","25":"tag-usa","26":"tag-washington"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/604149","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=604149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/604149\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/604150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=604149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=604149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=604149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}