Norway rejects US claim on forced labour, opposes tariffs

June 5 (Reuters) - Norway rejects a U.S. assessment that the Nordic country has failed to prevent forced labour, its foreign minister told Reuters, adding that the allegation was unfounded and should not be used by President Donald Trump to justify new tariffs.

The Trump administration on Tuesday proposed tariffs of up to 12.5% on imports from 60 countries, including Norway, after determining they had failed to curb trade in goods made with forced labour, an assertion many U.S. trading partners rejected.

"We strongly disagree with the U.S. authorities' assessment that Norway is not doing enough to prevent forced labour," Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs Espen Barth Eide said in a statement to Reuters late on Thursday.

"Norway was among the first countries to introduce legislation to prevent forced labour in supply chains, through the Transparency Act. We have communicated this clearly to U.S. authorities," Barth Eide said.

Trump's threat to slap new tariffs on trade partners will do little to fight modern slavery — and could even make things worse, experts, business groups and some human rights groups have said.

(Reporting by Jagoda Darlak, editing by Terje Solsvik)