The European Commission has strongly criticized recent threats by the United States to impose new tariffs on several major trading partners, including the European Union, as tensions rise around the implementation of a controversial transatlantic trade deal. The threatened tariffs come amid ongoing disputes over goods allegedly produced with forced labor.

The U.S. Trade Representative, Jamieson Greer, announced plans to consider additional tariffs of up to 12.5 percent on imports from about 60 economies, including the EU, United Kingdom, China, India, Canada, and others. The proposed measures are justified by Washington as necessary to address what it described as insufficient efforts by these countries and trading blocs to curb the importation of products linked to forced labor, which it claims undermines fair competition for American workers.

Among those facing a 10 percent tariff are Canada, Mexico, the EU, the UK, and Pakistan, while countries such as China, India, Japan, and Australia could encounter levies up to 12.5 percent. The announcement comes less than two weeks before the European Parliament is set to vote on the so-called Turnberry agreement, a trade deal reached last summer between European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and then-U.S. President Donald Trump. Under the deal, the EU would impose a 15 percent tariff on certain American goods, while removing tariffs on U.S. imports.

European officials condemned the U.S. threat as “unjustified.” Bernd Lange, the European Parliament’s chief negotiator on the Turnberry deal and chair of its trade committee, said the latest tariff threat appears to be a response to a February ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court. The court had limited former President Trump’s authority to impose tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, striking down earlier unilateral tariff actions against several trading partners. Lange described the U.S. move as a “desperate” attempt to find a new rationale for maintaining its tariff strategy and dismissed accusations that the EU has failed to combat forced labor as “absurd.”

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning also rejected the U.S. rationale, dubbing the tariff threat a “pretext for political manipulation.” The European Commission pointed out that it already enforces some of the world’s strictest measures against forced labor-related imports.

Olof Gill, deputy chief spokesman for the European Commission, said the body would carefully examine the preliminary findings of the U.S. investigation but affirmed that the EU views such tariffs as unjustified on the disputed grounds. The European Parliament is expected to vote on the Turnberry agreement on June 16, amid growing concerns that rising tariff tensions could further complicate transatlantic trade relations.