The European Union's trade commissioner Maros Sefcovic is meeting with US President Donald Trump's top trade officials to try to avoid steep US tariffs on EU goods as early as next week.
Sefcovic had two previous discussions with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer that have yet to alter Trump's plans to raise US import duties to match the rates charged by major trading partners and counteract their non-tariff trade barriers.
USTR and the EU's Washington delegation office had no immediate comment on the discussions.
The meetings on Tuesday come as some countries are preparing tariff concessions ahead of Trump's April 2 announcement of the reciprocal tariff plan, a day he has dubbed "Liberation Day" for the US economy from unfair trade practices.
Reuters reported on Tuesday that India is open to cutting tariffs on more than half of US imports, valued at $23 billion, in the first phase. India has among the highest trade-weighted average tariff rates at 12.1 per cent, compared to 2.5 per cent for the US, according to the World Trade Organisation.
A US delegation led by Assistant US Trade Representative Brendan Lynch is in New Delhi this week for trade talks with Indian officials from Tuesday through Saturday, the US embassy in New Delhi said.
Trump said on Monday he may give "a lot of countries" breaks on tariffs, but provided no details. Trump also said that separate tariffs on autos, pharmaceuticals and aluminium were coming in "the very near future".
EU officials have struggled to talk Trump back from a trade war as he embarks on a multi-front tariff offensive expected to draw strong retaliatory measures.
Sefcovic said last week that little progress has been made in talks with Washington after Trump imposed 25 per cent tariffs on steel and aluminum imports earlier this month.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney told reporters in Halifax that Canada was prepared to add retaliatory trade measures against the US, depending on Trump's April 2 trade actions.
Trump has also threatened to end a month-long tariff reprieve for goods compliant with the US-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement.
But Carney said Canada was not rushing to the negotiating table with Trump, with whom he has not spoken since taking office, adding he wants "substantive discussions" between sovereign nations - a reference to Trump's frequent demands Canada should be annexed by the US.
White House officials have cautioned that countries rushing for early tariff relief were unlikely to avoid them completely, because Trump's reciprocal duty calculations will include non-tariff barriers, currency policies and other factors that are harder to roll back.
Trump officials, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, have said that much of the reciprocal tariff focus will be on 15 countries that have the highest goods trade surpluses with the US Bessent has referred to these partners as the "Dirty 15."
They did not name these, but according to US Census Bureau data, the following trade partners had the largest trade surpluses with the US: China, the EU (as a bloc), Mexico, Vietnam, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Canada, India, Thailand, Switzerland, Malaysia, Indonesia, Cambodia and South Africa.
