LONDON (Reuters) -Britain and United States on Thursday said they had agreed a deal to resolve a trade dispute over Airbus and Boeing for the next five years, ensuring retaliatory tariffs remain suspended.
The agreement comes two days after the European Union also truce in their near 17-year conflict over aircraft subsidies, suspending for five years one set of Trump-era tariffs which had soured relations with the United States.
The two sides had been battling since 2004 in parallel cases at the World Trade Organization over subsidies for U.S. planemaker Boeing and European rival Airbus, which each argued exposed the other to unfair competition.
Britain has left the European Union since the dispute began and the Trump tariffs were imposed, and Thursday’s agreement achieves many of the same results as the EU-U.S. deal.
Both Britain and the United States have agreed to suspend retaliatory tariffs for 5 years and cooperate more closely on tackling unfair trade practices by non-market economies, Britain’s trade ministry said in a statement.
“This deal will support jobs across the country and is fantastic news for major employers like Scotch whisky and sectors like aerospace,” trade minister Liz Truss said.
(Reporting by Alistair Smout; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)
