Levente Magyar, a state secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, said the Hungarian government expects the European Commission to reach an agreement with the United States that would prevent planned punitive tariffs within two weeks.

After a meeting of the Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels on Monday, Magyar warned that the punitive tariffs would have serious economic consequences.

The ministers at the meeting discussed the state of play of trade negotiations after the announcement in Washington, DC, at the weekend of a planned 30pc tariff on European imports from August 1.

Magyar said the measure was a "serious escalation" and blamed the European Commission for failing to reach a fair agreement with the Americans that would protect European interests.

"We expect the Commission to come up with a way to reach an agreement with the Americans in the coming two weeks to avoid the 30pc punitive tariff, because if that materialises, it will hurt European competitiveness and have an extraordinarily negative impact on Hungary," he added.

"We are not willing to let Hungary, Hungarian businesses and Hungarian workers pay the price for the Commission's mistakes," he added.