It is a regret that China and the United States did not reach any agreement in their fifth round of textile consultation, Sun Huaibin, spokesman for the China Textile Industry Council, said here Thursday.

The negotiation, which started Monday in Washington D.C., was scheduled to end Tuesday but was extended to a third day to give both sides more time to narrow their differences.

"No agreement in the talks shows the US side does not change its previous stance, and the textile trade prospect between the two countries becomes more uncertain," Sun said.

China's textile industry regards it as a regret, he said.

China's Ministry of Commerce said on its web site that the three-day textile talks in Washington have made positive progress, but the two sides still have some divergences.

The two sides agreed to hold the next round of talks as soon as possible, and decide the time and venue through diplomatic channels, the Ministry said.

The textile trade between China and the United States is supplementary actually, because China imports cotton and outside materials from the United States, while the US side imports apparel from China, Sun said.

China needs American products, and American consumers need China's products, so the two sides should make joint efforts to safeguard such supplementary trade, he said.

China and the European Union have made important progress in safeguarding normal trade, but the United States disregards the overall situation and makes no compromises on this issue, which can not be understood by Chinese side, he said.

The fruitless Sino-US consultation makes China's textile export prospects more unclear, so the Council will advice Chinese textile companies to be more cautious when dealing with export business to the United States, he said.

Following the elimination of global textile quota on Jan. 1, 2005, the United States claimed that the surge of textile imports from China had disrupted its domestic market.

Since May this year, the US government has put restrictive measures against 21 categories of Chinese textile products, arousing strong objections from China.

The two countries have held five rounds of textile talks, with no substantive agreement reached.

Source: Xinhua