BRASILIA, Brazil (AFP)—Brazil vowed Thursday to combat US President Donald Trump’s tariffs on its exports, saying it intends to lodge appeals if last-ditch negotiations fail.

Finance Minister Fernando Haddad said the tariffs announced Wednesday were “more favorable” than expected, with several key export products exempted.

Still, there “is a lot of injustice in the measures announced yesterday. Corrections need to be made,” he told reporters.

Citing a “witch hunt” against his far-right ally Jair Bolsonaro — Brazil’s former president on trial for allegedly plotting a coup — Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order adding a 40 percent tariff on Brazilian products, bringing total trade duties to 50 percent.

The levies affect coffee and meat, two products of which Brazil is the world’s top exporter.

The order, which takes effect on August 6, listed exemptions for nearly 700 other products including key exports such as planes, orange juice and pulp, Brazil nuts, and some iron, steel and aluminum products.

Leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva — the man Bolsonaro is accused of having sought to topple — has denounced the tariffs as an attack on the “sovereignty” of South America’s largest economy.

“The negotiation is not over; it starts today,” Vice President Geraldo Alckmin, tapped to oversee talks with Washington, told TV Globo.

Alckmin said the new tariff will apply to nearly 36 percent of Brazil’s exports to the United States, equal to some $14.5 billion last year.

Haddad said he would speak with his American counterpart, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and “there will be a cycle of negotiations.”