How US has tried to control China's tech

For years, officials in Washington have used export controls to slow China's ability to develop cutting-edge technologies, especially ones with military applications like semiconductors and artificial intelligence.

- MEAGHAN TOBIN

Over the past decade, these export controls have driven a wedge between the world’s two largest economies.

When officials from the United States and China met this week in London to try to work out their differences over trade, export controls were again front and centre.

"In eight years of negotiating with the Chinese, I have never had a meeting where they didn’t want to talk about export controls," Jamieson Greer, the US trade representative, said Tuesday.

It is not clear what actions US officials agreed to take in exchange for China easing its exports of rare earth metals - a key sticking point for Washington.

But the pillars of US export controls to slow the flow of advanced technology to China appear to remain intact.

FIRST TRUMP TERM

During his first term, Trump, asserting that China had ripped off the United States, used export controls as one tool among many in his effort to correct imbalances of trade and manufacturing.

Trump kicked off a trade war with Beijing in 2018 when he put tariffs on solar panels imported from China. The ensuing tit-for-tat tariffs ranged from 15% to 30%, and soon encompassed airplanes, cars and other goods.