EU imposes new anti-dumping duties to Chinese steel

BRUSSELS - The European Commission decided on Wednesday to impose anti-dumping duties of up to 28.5 percent on certain corrosion-resistant steels from China.

The European Commission, or the European Union's executive arm, said, after an eight-month investigation, it found that the above products benefited from unfair subsidies.

"It was provisionally concluded that the imposition of measures would contribute to the recovery of the (European) Union industry by allowing price increases enabling the industry as a whole to return to a profitable situation," the Commission said in a statement.

The new EU import duties range from 17.2 percent to 28.5 percent, and will affect Shougang Group, Shagang Group, Hesteel Group and some other Chinese companies.

The companies have 25 days to challenge the EU decision at a hearing.

The EU has imposed anti-dumping tariffs on various Chinese steel products in recent years. On April 6, the European Commission decided to impose anti-dumping duties on hot-rolled flat steel products from China.

A Chinese Ministry of Commerce statement said the EU continued the use of the unfair and unreasonable "surrogate country approach" in the investigation, which resulted in artificially-determined high anti-dumping duties for Chinese products and thus seriously undermined Chinese enterprises' interests.