{"id":7676,"date":"2025-04-25T09:39:06","date_gmt":"2025-04-25T09:39:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/?p=7676"},"modified":"2025-04-25T09:39:08","modified_gmt":"2025-04-25T09:39:08","slug":"swiss-leader-says-us-foresees-privileged-talks-with-15-countries-on-us-tariffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/?p=7676","title":{"rendered":"Swiss leader says US foresees ‘privileged’ talks with 15 countries on US tariffs"},"content":{"rendered":"
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GENEVA — <\/span>The Swiss president says Switzerland is among 15 countries with which the United States plans to conduct \u201cprivileged\u201d negotiations to help reach a deal in the wake of sweeping U.S. tariffs on dozens of countries that have shaken global markets.<\/p>\n

Karin Keller-Sutter, in an interview with broadcaster SRF published Friday, said she was \u201csatisfied\u201d with talks in Washington this week that included an International Monetary Fund conference<\/a> and her one-on-one meeting with U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Keller-Sutter also serves as Switzerland\u2019s finance minister.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe United States has defined a group of 15 countries with which it wants to find … a quick solution in this tariff question. Switzerland is part of this group of these 15 countries,\u201d she told reporters separately late Thursday in Washington.<\/p>\n

It was not immediately clear which 14 other countries were included, but she told SRF that \u201cthe U.S. envisages conducting \u2014 I would say somewhat privileged \u2014 negotiations and finding solutions\u201d with that group.<\/p>\n

Before the Trump administration paused some of its most stringent tariff plans<\/a>, products imported from Switzerland had been set to face tariffs of 31% \u2014 more than the 20% tariffs on goods from the European Union. Switzerland is not a member of the 27-country bloc. <\/p>\n

According to figures published by the Swiss Embassy in Washington, the U.S. has been Switzerland\u2019s most important goods export market worldwide since 2021, while Switzerland is the fourth most important export market for U.S. services. The bilateral trade volume in goods and services between Switzerland and the U.S. reached a total of $185.9 billion in 2023, the embassy says on its website.<\/p>\n

Keller-Sutter said a memorandum of understanding was to be drawn up after which negotiations can begin. A document would also lay out the most important topics, and \u201cwe have also been assigned a specific contact person. This is not easy in the U.S. administration,\u201d she was quoted as saying.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe U.S. authorities have clearly expressed their desire to find a solution with Switzerland,\u201d Keller-Sutter told SRF. She said no timetable had been set, but the two sides agreed to move forward quickly \u201cbecause uncertainty is poison for the economy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s sweeping \u201cLiberation Day\u201d tariffs on April 2 set off turmoil in world stock markets. A week later, Trump spoke by phone with Keller-Sutter in a conversation that her office said focused on tariffs. She emphasized the \u201cimportant role of Swiss companies and investments” in the U.S.<\/p>\n

Hours later, Trump announced the U-turn that paused the steep new tariffs on about 60 countries for 90 days, fanning speculation \u2014 which was not confirmed \u2014 in some Swiss media that her chat with Trump might have played a role in the change of course.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, Swiss Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis, during a trip to Beijing, said the U.S. tariffs have thrust the affected countries into \u201ca sort of coalition\u201d to try to reach a deal with the United States. And on Monday, Swiss pharmaceuticals giant Roche announced plans to invest $50 billion<\/a> in the U.S. over the next five years \u2014 an unspecified amount of which has already been under way.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

GENEVA — The Swiss president says Switzerland is among 15 countries with which the United States plans to conduct \u201cprivileged\u201d negotiations to help reach a deal in the wake of sweeping U.S. tariffs on dozens of countries that have shaken global markets. Karin Keller-Sutter, in an interview with broadcaster SRF published Friday, said she was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7677,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7676","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7676","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7676"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7676\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7678,"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7676\/revisions\/7678"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/firearmman.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}