As the trade war between the United States and China intensifies, Beijing has started censoring some tariff-related content on social media, news agency Reuters reported.
Hashtags and searches for “tariff” or “104” (the tariff amount in percentage) have been blocked on the social media platform Weibo, with pages showing an error message. Follow live updates.
The hashtags returned an error message that said: “Sorry, the content of this topic is not displayed,” The New York Times reported.
The censorship also extended to WeChat, where a wide range of posts from Chinese companies that highlighted the negative impact of Trump’s tariffs were taken down, a review by Reuters found.
Also Read | Why did Donald Trump raise US tariffs on China to 125% and hit pause elsewhere?
The censored posts were marked by the same label stating the “content was suspected of violating relevant laws, regulations, and policies”.
On the other hand, hashtags which appeared as mocking the United States and suggesting that the North American country has a egg shortage were amongst the most viewed on Weibo, according to Reuters.
Chinese state broadcaster CCTV also started a hashtag on the line of it: “#UShastradewarandaneggshortage.”
US-China trade war
Since taking office in January, US President Donald Trump has raised the tariff on Chinese goods five times.
The first two hikes of 10% each were met with what analysts described as a measured response from China that left the door open for talks. But after Trump announced an additional 34% duty on Chinese goods last week, along with tariffs on other countries in his “Liberation Day”, China matched that with a 34% tariff on imports from the US.
Also Read | What could be China’s next step as Donald Trump slaps it with 125% tariffs?
Following China’s retaliations, Trump then added a 50% tariff on goods from China, saying negotiations were terminated, and bringing the cumulative US. tariff to 104%.
China again responded by raising the tariff on American products by the same amount, bringing its total rate to 84%.
Then Trump announced a 90-day pause on higher tariffs on trade partners, but raised duties on China to 125%.
Meanwhile, amid tension between the two nations, China has warned its citizens to “assess the risks” before travelling to the United States
