South Korea said it planned to intensify trade talks with the United States and considered U.S. President Donald Trump's plan for a 25% tariff from August 1 as effectively extending a grace period on implementing the levies.

The country’s new president, in office for a little over a month, had just dispatched his senior deputies to Washington to try to work out a trade deal.

New vehicles from the Japanese auto makers Subaru and Honda are seen at a parking lot in the Port of Richmond, as trade tensions escalate after U.S. President Donald Trump said he would impose a 25% tariff on goods from Japan and South Korea starting on August 1,