China hits back at US steel pipe decision

China on Thursday decried a US decision to impose duties of 10 to 16% on Chinese-made steel pipe, the biggest US trade case to date against China, and said it had been made a scapegoat of protectionist interests.

The ministry of commerce said it was "strongly dissatisfied with and resolutely opposed" to the vote of the US.

International Trade Commission for countervailing duties, which Washington said were needed to balance out unfair state subsidies to Chinese makers of pipes for oil wells.

The global financial crisis and fall in demand for oil, not Chinese policies, were to blame for pressures on US manufacturers, said a statement issued on the ministry's website (www.mofcom.gov.cn).

"US domestic industry has been seeking opportunities to win trade relief and protection, and shifted the blame for its hardships onto imports," an unnamed ministry official said in the statement. "Finding that Chinese oil well pipes have damaged US industry is a mistaken step that ignores the facts."

The ministry made no mention of any tit-for-tat moves against US products, but these cannot be ruled out. It urged Washington to abandon the decision at a final vote on the anti-dumping case in May.

But a lawyer representing the United Steelworkers union and US companies in the case earlier told Reuters that hearing is virtually certain to also approve separate anti-dumping duties on the pipes.

The ITC vote capped a year of US-China trade friction likely to extend into 2010.

US companies and unions brought about a dozen trade cases against China this year, alleging government subsidies and unfair pricing practices.

US president Barack Obama also angered Beijing in September by slapping a 35% duty on imports of about $1.85 billion of Chinese-made tyres in response to what the ITC said was a surge in imports that disrupted the market.

China, in response, accused the United States of protectionism, filed a complaint against the tyres decision at the World Trade Organisation and began a probe into whether US autos are "dumped" in China at unfairly low prices.

The United States imported $2.74 billion of "oil country tubular goods" from China in 2008, more than triple the previous year, as rises in oil prices led to increased demand for the oil well tubing and casing.