“No matter how many times this report is published, and how many versions they come up with, it can not change that it is completely political and false,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said on Sunday.
Mr Wang emphasized the need for US intelligence to back up the report, which the Chinese authorities said was “politically motivated” and called on the United States to stop “attacking and blackmailing China”.
– DISINFECT: An employee disinfects a bus to prevent virus transmission in Yantai in Shandong Province in eastern China. Photo: AFP / NTB
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Will hardly find out how it spread
An extended version of the intelligence report was released earlier this week, which states, among other things, that US intelligence will hardly find out whether the coronavirus spread to humans through a natural encounter with animals or through a leak from a laboratory in Wuhan.
The report added that Chinese cooperation is likely to be needed if any conclusions can be drawn about the origin of the virus, and that China continues to thwart the global investigation.
– VACCINE: Children get vaccinated in Huzhou State, Zhejiang Province. Photo: China Daily / Reuters / NTB
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Pressure on China
Pressure has been put on China to consider a new investigation into the origin of the virus, after a delayed and highly politicized visit by the World Health Organization could not come to anything. Beijing has rejected these demands, and believes there are political motives behind them.
President Joe Biden, who commissioned the report from the intelligence agencies, said in August that China was withholding important information about the origin of the virus. At the time, the theory that the virus was leaked from a laboratory became more popular, although US intelligence largely does not believe the virus was man-made.
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