'Unhappy' Trump To Set Out China Response On Friday

US President Donald Trump said he would give a media conference on Friday on China amid spiralling Sino-US tensions over Hong Kong and the coronavirus fallout.

"We'll be announcing tomorrow what we're doing with respect to China," he told reporters at an Oval Office meeting on Thursday, saying "we're not happy with China," but giving no specific details about his plans.

Fears that Beijing will use a new law to end Hong Kong's freedom as a semi-autonomous territory have prompted expectations that Trump plans to hit back, possibly signalling a wider confrontation between the two economic superpowers.

David Stilwell, the top US State Department official for East Asia, stressed that the United States did not want to hurt the people of Hong Kong, adding: "This decision was made by the government in Beijing, and not by the US."

The Foreign Ministry's office in Hong Kong said on Thursday that the US revoking Hong Kong's special status was "the most barbaric, the most unreasonable and the most shameless".

Washington and Beijing are already clashing over responsibility for the extent of the coronavirus pandemic, which originated in China but has caused devastation in the United States.

Trump blames the crisis on China, although his domestic critics accuse him of mismanagement. (AFP)

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