The European Union will respond to US tariffs imposed on steel and aluminum in a "responsible and reasonable" way, European Council President Donald Tusk said in a letter published on Tuesday.
EU leaders will discuss the threat of a trade war at their summit on March 22-23 in Brussels, by when they should know if the United States has been willing to exempt the European Union from the metals tariffs.
Tusk said that the European Union must prepare for all possible scenarios. "As the world’s biggest trading power, the EU’s response will be responsible and reasonable," he wrote in his invitation letter to EU leaders.
Tusk also wrote in his letter of the need to put the current trade dispute in perspective even if US tariffs would require a suitable response. "When the US raised tariffs in 1930, which applied to one-third of our trade, it led to a global trade war. The tariffs currently proposed, if implemented, would affect around 1.5 percent of transatlantic trade," Reuters cited him as saying.
Tusk also warned that some of the bloc's leaders were not yet ready to back a Brexit transition deal at a summit in Brussels.
