US-China trade respite eases EU fears of being flooded with Chinese goods

BRUSSELS (Reuters) -The easing of trade tensions between the United States and China is a step in the right direction and helps reduce European fears of being flooded with Chinese goods redirected from the U.S. market, European Economic Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis said.

Speaking to reporters after a meeting of European Union finance ministers on Tuesday, Dombrovskis noted, however, that the reduction of tariffs after weekend talks in Switzerland was for 90 days and the tariff rates that remained were still high.

"Obviously this easing of trade tensions between the U.S. and China is heading in the right direction but it is worth noting that the 30% tariffs which the U.S. would continue to apply to Chinese goods, also in this 90-day period, is still quite a high tariff level and correspondingly trade distortive," he said.

"But of course it may ease somewhat the trade diversion concerns we had," Dombrovskis told a news conference.

The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, urged China on April 8 to ensure that goods that could no longer enter the U.S. because of prohibitively high tariffs were not redirected to the EU.

On Monday, Washington also announced that the United States would cut the "de minimis" tariff for low-value items imported from China, further de-escalating a potentially damaging trade war between the world's two largest economies.

(Reporting by Jan Strupczewsk. Editing by Mark Potter)