Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on February 10, 2025
1 min readLast updated: January 26, 2026
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The EU will counter Trump's new 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, French Foreign Minister Barrot confirms. The European Commission will decide on affected sectors.
PARIS (Reuters) - The European Union will respond to U.S. President Donald Trump's latest tariffs announcement, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said on Monday.
Barrot told TF1 television that France and its European partners should not hesitate to defend their interests in the face of the U.S. tariff threats.
Trump said on Sunday that he will introduce new 25% tariffs on all steel and aluminum imports into the U.S., on top of existing metals duties, in another major escalation of his trade policy overhaul.
Asked if France and the European Union will respond, Barrot said: "Of course... This is already what Donald Trump did in 2018, and we responded. We will again respond."
The European Commission will decide on the sectors that will be affected by a response, he added.
"It (the Commission) is ready to push the trigger when the time has come. Now this time has come. It is in no-one's interest to start a commercial war with the European Union," he said.
(Reporting by Dominique Vidalon; Editing by Sudip Kar-Gupta)
The main topic is the EU's planned response to Trump's new tariffs on steel and aluminum imports.
France, along with the EU, responded to similar tariffs in 2018 and plans to do so again.
The European Commission will decide which sectors will be affected by the EU's response.
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