DHAKA: President Donald Trump will seek a tax on goods imported from Mexico and use the revenue to build a border wall, the White House spokesman has said.

The plan was announced just after the Mexican president cancelled a visit to Washington, amid a row sparked by the question of who will pay for the wall, reports the BBC.

But soon after revealing it, the White House said that was only one option.

Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order to create a wall on the US southern border with Mexico. Making Mexico pay for it was one of his key election campaign pledges.

But President Enrique Pena Nieto has always insisted that will not happen and on Thursday he pulled out of next week's White House meeting.

Hours later, White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters the president had discussed the funding proposal with lawmakers, and it could be part of a tax reform package the US Congress is planning.

He said that a 20% tax could generate approximately $10bn (£8bn) in tax revenue per year.

But Reince Priebus, the White House chief of staff, later said that the border tax is only one of several options being considered.

President Pena Nieto would have been perceived as very weak if he had travelled to Washington for talks and for many here it would have been tantamount to accepting Trump's central claim - that Mexico will pay for the US border wall.

If that is not up front, then it may come eventually - perhaps under the latest proposal being floated by Donald Trump's White House, a massive 20% border tax on Mexican imports.

As Mexico exports some $300bn of goods a year to the US, the impact of such a proposal would be felt across the country.

Furthermore, the idea of funding a wall through a new tariff is simply unacceptable to most ordinary Mexicans who view the wall as unnecessary, inhumane, expensive and ineffective.

BDST: 0915 HRS, JAN 27, 2017
AP