President Donald Trump has delayed imposing higher tariffs on US imports, while sending letters to 14 countries including Japan and South Korea detailing the levies they face.
The development comes as a 90-day pause the White House placed on some of its most aggressive import taxes was set to expire this week.
The president renewed his threat of a 25 per cent tax on products entering the country from Japan and South Korea and shared a batch of other letters to world leaders warning of levies from August 1.
Higher tariffs had been set to come into effect on July 9, having previously been suspended with White House officials saying they would look to strike trade deals.
When asked by a reporter whether the new August date was a hard deadline, Trump said: “I would say firm, but not 100 percent firm.”
He said “If they call up and they say we’d like to do something a different way, we’re going to be open to that.”
Economist Adam Ahmad Samdin from research firm Oxford Economics told the BBC that the extension came as no surprise, since trade agreements often take years to finalise.
English (US) ·