Relations between China and the United States have been at a point of maximum tension in recent days.. The governments of both countries have recently clashed over the incident of the alleged spy balloons shot down in North American territory, the peace plan proposed by Beijing for the war in Ukraine, the veto of Congress to the popular video platform TikTok, among other issues. .
But there is an issue that has not ceased to be a focus of discussions between Washington and Beijing: covid-19. Since the pandemic was declared in 2020, Both nations have been locked in a series of discussions about the origin of the virus that affected the world.
Just this week, the clashes were revived due to statements by the intelligence agencies of the United States, which ensure that the covid-19 was probably caused by a failure in a laboratory in Wuhanthe city where the spread of the disease began.
What does the American theory say and what does China respond to it?
What the US Says
This Tuesday, the director of the US federal police (FBI), Christopher Wray, said in an interview with the US chain foxnews who thinks that The pandemic caused by the covid-19 virus was “probably” caused by a leak in a laboratory in the Chinese city of Wuhan, origin of the disease.
“The FBI has maintained for quite some time that the origins of the pandemic probably lie with a possible incident at a laboratory in Wuhan,” Wray said.
(You can read: Avian flu: could a next pandemic be more deadly?)
The FBI has maintained that the origins of the pandemic are likely due to a laboratory incident.
Wray’s comments come just hours after it became known that the US Department of Energy concluded that covid-19 “most likely” originated in a Chinese laboratory, According to a report published by the newspaper The Wall Street Journal.
The finding, the result of an alleged new intelligence analysis, is significant because that department oversees a national network of laboratories, including some that conduct advanced biological research.
The newspaper noted that four other US departments continue to believe that, probably, the coronavirus outbreak was the result of natural transmission, while two others are undecided.
Without confirming that article, the spokesman for the White House National Security Council, John Kirby, acknowledged last Monday that within the US Administration there is no consensus on the origin of the pandemic and that Washington wants “facts” in order to avoid other pandemics in the future.
For his part, the United States ambassador to China, Nicholas Burns, said Monday that Beijing should be more honest about the origin of covid-19 if it wants to work with its government.
(Also: China reopens its borders and returns to a life without sanitary bubbles due to covid)
China’s response
But China strongly rejected the hypothesis on Monday and said it felt “dirty” by these new accusations.
And this Wednesday, Beijing went further and accused the United States of weighing down its own credibility. “The United States is once again stirring up the laboratory leak theory, which does not discredit China, but further undermines its own credibility,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning told a conference on Wednesday. press.
The Chinese authorities have repeatedly denied the thesis that the virus arose in a laboratory, affirming that this version is part of a smear campaign against Beijing.
Until we have more evidence, all hypotheses are on the table.
But the truth is that the scientific community considers it crucial to determine the origin of the pandemic to better combat it or even prevent the next one.
(Keep reading: ‘Tragic battle’ in Chinese hospitals, after the spread of the covid)
The World Health Organization (WHO), for its part, affirms that it has not received any information about the inquiries from the US Department of Energy and that it continues to examine “all available scientific evidence,” according to its spokesman, Tarik Jasarevic, to AFP.
“We urge China and the scientific community to carry out the necessary studies” to determine the origin of the virus, he added. “Until we have more evidence, all hypotheses are on the table.”
In mid-February, the WHO vowed to do everything possible “until we find the answer” about the origins of covid, refuting a report that suggested the UN body had abandoned the investigation.
ANGIE RUIZ
INTERNATIONAL WRITING
*With AFP and EFE
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