Gina Raimondo, US secretary of commerce, speaks during an interview in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, March 2, 2023. Senior officials from the Department of Commerce will be traveling to Beijing and Shanghai next week as part of an effort to lay groundwork for a potential trip by Secretary Gina Raimondo later this year, according to people familiar with the planning. Elizabeth Economy, a senior advisor to the secretary on China issues, and Scott Tatlock, the deputy assistant secretary for China and Mongolia, will assess whether such a meeting between Raimondo and her Chinese counterparts would produce results to justify the visit. A visit by Secretary of State Antony Blinken, set for early February, was postponed indefinitely as tensions escalated during a Chinese surveillance balloon's cross-country trip. Since then, Commerce has taken an ad hoc approach to sensitive trade issues.

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