international trade center the joint development agency of the united nations and the world trade organization geneva thank you very much for joining us on the program now the latest that we've heard from china is that this move from the united states represents the overtures to the biggest trade war in history is that rhetoric or fact in your opinion. well i think we are facing the largest trade conflict since the second world war but more importantly is that this conflict is already having an impact on the ground it's already affecting workers that are being laid off as a result of decisions especially in america to move out of the country and produce elsewhere given that their eaves is having an impact on businesses that are not making capital investment decisions because of the uncertainty of the situation but let's not forget our taxes taxes that the consumer will have to pay it will make it is making already american consumers. pay more for the goods they buy and it's making american companies less competitive because the the inputs the import in their manufacturing chains will be more expensiv

international trade center the joint development agency of the united nations and the world trade organization geneva thank you very much for joining us on the program now the latest that we've heard from china is that this move from the united states represents the overtures to the biggest trade war in history is that rhetoric or fact in your opinion. well i think we are facing the largest trade conflict since the second world war but more importantly is that this conflict is already having an impact on the ground it's already affecting workers that are being laid off as a result of the solutions especially in america to move out of the country and produce elsewhere given that they're eaves is having an impact on businesses that are not making capital investment decisions because of the uncertainty of the situation but let's not forget our taxes taxes that the consumer will have to pay it will make it is making already american consumers. pay more for the goods they buy and it's making american companies less competitive because the the inputs the import in their manufacturing chains will be more ex

on wednesday, china appears before the world trade organization in geneva as part of a regular reviewntries in the trade grouping. the chinese government has said it remains fully committed to opening up its economy under wto rules. also on wednesday, the malaysians central bank meets and on thursday it is south korea's central bank's turn. will they raise rates to keep pace with the us? and on thursday as well, donald trump is expected to arrive in the uk. to get a sense of what all this means about the economic calendar ahead, investment adviser brock silber says he is being cautious about xiaomi because he feels it is riddled with red flags. it strikes me as a very expensive way to get involved with a company with very modest profit and perhaps misaligned interests between management and shareholders as well as, i think, a confused model. and looking forward to the later part of the week we have china at the wto. all of this being framed against that backdrop of beijing and washington fighting it out over trade. what do you think the conversation at the wto will be about and how su

the director general of the world trade organization joined me from geneva to discuss the next step. welcome to the program. >> my pleasure. >> let me just start with a big sort of fine the eu levied against google. $5 billion in punitive levies there. of course, the united states president, donald trump, who thinks the world is taking advantage of the u.s., is saying this is more evidence of europe taking advantage of us. do you think this is true, taking advantage? do you think it's likely to set off more tariffs? >> i think this whole episode actually demonstrates what we have been saying for quite some time. we need to update the rules of global trade. this is part of the trade scenario. we have in the particularly digital world, a whole range of new practices, new business practices, new challenges that are unregulated on a global level. these kind of different views -- the eu has privacy and content. the u.s. has different views. other countries have different -- we need to sit down and harmonize that somewhat. while we don't do that, these kind of instability and unpredictabil