China trade surplus triples

SHANGHAI, China — China’s trade surplus surged to $101.9 billion in 2005, more than triple the $32 billion gap recorded the year before, according to customs figures released Wednesday.

Exports rose 28.4 percent year-on-year in 2005 to $762 billion, while imports rose 17.6 percent to $660 billion, the General Administration of Customs said in a report posted on its Web site.

With total global trade of $1.42 trillion, China is now the world’s third-biggest trading nation, the report said. China announced earlier that it had overtaken Japan in terms of merchandise trade and remained behind the United States and Germany.

The figures were largely in line with expectations, but they were likely to intensify pressure for Beijing to loosen foreign exchange controls that U.S. officials and other critics contend keep the Chinese currency, the yuan, undervalued, making Chinese exports relatively cheap in overseas markets.

A leading U.S. lawmaker, Sen. Max Baucus, said during a visit to Beijing that he had warned senior Chinese officials that the persisting trade imbalance with the U.S. was bound to draw a backlash.

“The imbalance simply exists. It’s there. It’s a fact, and it has to be dealt with. And it is a major irritant in U.S.-China relations,” said Baucus (D-Mont.), a member of the powerful Senate Finance Committee.