Turkey expects that the United States will lift a 10 percent tariff on its exports, Trade Minister Ömer Bolat said Wednesday, ahead of a planned visit to Washington next month to press the issue, Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency reported.
Speaking at Osaka Expo 2025 during an official visit to Japan, Bolat told reporters that Turkey will make a “concrete request” for the removal of the tariffs during his upcoming trip, according to remarks carried by Anadolu.
“It is natural for the US to prioritize countries with which it has a trade deficit,” Bolat said. “The US has a surplus in relation to us. In that sense, we expect the 10 percent tariff to be removed.”
Bolat is in Japan with a delegation of Turkish government and business officials seeking to deepen economic ties between the two countries. He said Turkey’s trade ties with the US remain strong and emphasized Ankara’s goal of expanding its commercial presence in North and South America through its Far Countries Strategy.
Bolat said Turkey aims to reach a $100 billion bilateral trade volume with the US in the long term and that efforts by the Turkey Exporters Assembly and the Foreign Economic Relations Board would be intensified to meet that target.
Calling the US Turkey’s second-largest trading partner after the European Union, Bolat described trade between the two countries as balanced. He warned that rising uncertainty and protectionism in global markets could damage the world economy.
“We hope that countries realize the importance of multilateralism in trade and act with common sense,” he said, according to Anadolu. “When everyone closes in on themselves, when trade decreases, impoverishment will occur in the world and the world’s national income will shrink.”
On April 2 President Donald Trump declared a national economic emergency and announced a 10 percent baseline tariff on imports from nearly all countries, effective April 5. The measure, part of what the White House dubbed “Liberation Day” tariffs, was enacted under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to address what the administration described as a persistent US trade deficit.