The U.S. Government requested dispute settlement consultations with China at the World Trade Organization (WTO) on automobiles duties, a senior trade official announced Thursday.

U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk said the federal government was challenging China's imposition of antidumping and countervailing duties on more than $3 billion worth of automobiles the U.S. exported to China.

Consultations are the first step in a WTO dispute. Under WTO rules, if parties do not resolve a matter through consultations within 60 days, complaints may request the establishment of a WTO dispute settlement panel.

In December 2011, China imposed antidumping and countervailing duties on imports of U.S. cars and SUVs with an engine capacity of 2.5 liters or larger. Then Chinese Commerce Minister Chen Deming said the measures were taken after China conducted open investigations in accordance with the WTO rules and upon petitions from domestic enterprises.

Thursday's announcement is another enforcement action the U.S. has brought against China during an election year in which President Barack Obama and Republican president hopeful Mitt Romney are trying to appear tough on China. Romney said as president he would label China a currency manipulator during the campaign, a move Obama so far had not taken.

Obama on Thursday boasted on a campaign event in the U.S. state of Ohio that his administration brought trade cases against China at a faster pace than the previous administration and said the new action aimed to "hold China accountable for unfair trade practices that harm American automakers," which was a major theme of his re-election campaign.

Ohio is a major battleground state, where automakers have been affected by the tariffs. It highlighted how U.S. trade relations with China could color the political debate ahead of the presidential election in November.

The WTO request was the third time that the Obama Administration had challenged China's trade remedies, said Ron Kirk. In two earlier cases, the U.S. challenged duties that China had imposed to restrict imports of certain steel and chicken products. It also brought actions against China's restrictions on electronic payment services and subsidies to China's wind power equipment sector. In addition, the U.S. invoked a China-specific safeguard to impose punitive duties on imports of Chinese passenger and light truck tires.

Obama claimed that the initiative on Chinese tires had saved 1, 200 manufacturing jobs, but the total cost to American consumers from higher prices resulting from the tire safeguard tariffs was $1.1 billion in 2011, said Gary Clyde Hufbauer and Martin Vieiro, both of whom are with the Peterson Institute for International Economics, in a report.

Most recently, the Obama Administration also asked the WTO to establish a dispute settlement panel on June 27 to decide U.S. claims regarding China's export restraints on several industrial raw materials, including rare earths.

In February, the Obama Administration established an Interagency Trade Enforcement Center (ITEC) to get tougher against its trade partners like China.

(Xinhua News Agency July 5, 2012)