A new insult from Biden to the UAE
US President Joe Biden’s administration insulted the UAE regime by deliberately low representation in the first Abu Dhabi communication.
The UAE announced that a phone call would be made between its Foreign Minister Abdullah bin Zayed and the US special envoy on Iran, Robert Malley.
The call took place after the new US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken refused to receive a phone call from Abdullah bin Zayed.
Informed sources said that the UAE regime is more comfortable with the Biden administration’s increasing neglect.
A few days ago, the Biden administration shocked the UAE by cancelling a new President Donald Trump’s recent decision in favor of Abu Dhabi.
The White House said Biden intends to maintain customs duties on aluminum imports from the UAE.
This is in retreat from a step taken by former President Donald Trump to end the fees on the last day of his presidency.
Trump said on January 20 that he would exempt the UAE from 10 percent customs duties imposed on most aluminum imports in 2018, adding that the two countries had reached a quota agreement that would limit aluminum imports.
The waiver was due to take effect on Wednesday.
Shortly after declaring the UAE a “major security partner” and signing an agreement to sell 50 F-35 fighter jets, Trump granted the waiver.
Last week, the Biden administration said it would temporarily suspend this and other agreements for review.
On Monday night, the White House decision said the aluminum tariffs would be more effective in protecting domestic producers from the “untested quota” announced by Trump.
Biden said, “In my view, the available evidence indicates that imports from the UAE are still replacing domestic production and thus threatening to harm our national security.”
“I think it is necessary and appropriate in light of our national security interests that we keep at this time the customs duties applied to aluminum imports from the United Arab Emirates,” he added.
A White House spokeswoman said reversing Trump’s decision should not be seen as a “detriment of the close diplomatic relationship between the United States and the UAE,” but rather part of a broader review of the previous administration’s trade policies, including tariffs.
She added, “President Biden’s priority is to re-establish a smart process for making foreign and trade policy on the basis of deliberative economic analysis and a strategy that guarantees equal opportunities for the American worker to compete internationally.”
Biden said Trump imposed tariffs for the first time in 2018 to revive stalled aluminum facilities, open smelters and closed factories, and increase domestic production by reducing the United States’ dependence on foreign producers, adding that this need remains.
He stated that the US Commerce Department could have granted waivers to Emirati producers if it found that local producers were not harmed. Instead, they rejected 32 of the 33 exemption requests from Emirati producers before Trump’s decision.
The White House said that the US data also showed a 25% decline in aluminum imports from the UAE after the duties, compared to a 22% increase in domestic aluminium production during 2019, before the Coronavirus pandemic.
According to data from the US Trade Representative’s office, total aluminum imports from the UAE amounted to $1.3 billion in 2019.
