China said on Thursday it will hold a fresh round of trade talks with the United States in Washington later this month, offering a glimmer of hope for progress in resolving a conflict that has set world markets on edge.

A Chinese delegation led by Vice Minister of Commerce Wang Shouwen will meet with U.S. representatives led by Under Secretary of Treasury for International Affairs David Malpass, the Ministry of Commerce said in a statement on its website.

The world's two largest economies have implemented several rounds of tit-for-tat tariffs on each others goods since the start of the year and have threatened further tariffs on exports worth hundreds of billions of dollars.

The announcement of the forthcoming meeting comes after a lull in talks between the two sides, but it is unclear whether it will take place before or after Aug. 23, when Washington is due to activate additional tariffs on $16 billion of Chinese goods. Beijing has said it will retaliate in kind.

The last official round of talks was in early June when U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross met Chinese Vice Premier Liu He in Beijing.

There was no immediate response from the U.S. Treasury to the announcement from Beijing.

The upcoming meeting is lower-level compared with four previous rounds of talks that involved Liu, Ross and U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin.