Swiss held ‘constructive’ tariff meeting in Washington

Parmelin speaks of "constructive meetings" in Washington Keystone-SDA

Swiss economics minister Guy Parmelin says a meeting in Washington to discuss tariffs with United States officials was "constructive".

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Switzerland sees good opportunities for both countries and wants to strengthen the partnership, he wrote on the social media platform X on Saturday night.

Parmelin met with US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick, treasury secretary Scott Bessent and trade representative Jamieson Greer. The talks are part of the second round of negotiations in the tariff dispute with the US.

+ What do the 39% US tariffs mean for the Swiss economy?

After a meeting with Lutnick on Friday, Parmelin had not commented on the progress of the talks. When asked by Swiss public broadcaster SRF, he merely explained that things had gone as they had. Lutnick had previously told Bloomberg TV that he was not optimistic. Switzerland earns a lot of money in the US with its pharmaceutical products, he added.

Swiss foreign minister Ignazio Cassis had told the Keystone-SDA news agency at an event that Switzerland had prepared an “optimised offer” to the US. Parmelin put this on the table in Washington. The government has not yet disclosed any details.

Pre-loaded talks

The new round of negotiations became necessary after US President Donald Trump imposed import tariffs of 39% on numerous Swiss products at the beginning of August. A few days later, Swiss president Karin Keller-Sutter and Parmelin travelled to Washington without achieving any results.

Prior to this, on July 31, Keller-Sutter had spoken to Trump on the phone. He had blamed Switzerland for a trade deficit of $40 billion. She did not accept this. “I represented Switzerland’s interests here,” said Keller-Sutter.

On the phone, Trump told her very quickly that the trade deficit with Switzerland would justify a tariff of at least 30%.

The US tariff policy hits Switzerland particularly hard. At 39%, the rate is significantly higher than the EU, for example, which gets off comparatively lightly at 15%.

Translated from German with DeepL/mga

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