© Associated Press
– China rejects coronavirus release theory from Wuhan laboratory and opposes version of US military laboratory leak
Zhao Lijiang, the military spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, suggested in May 2020 that US military athletes had brought COVID-19 to Wuhan, the city from which the pandemic began.
The United States then expressed outrage at the claim, which was not supported by any publicly available evidence, and Zhao’s colleagues were not enthusiastic about supporting it.
Fourteen months later, when Zhao dropped the version again, he was joined by his boss, Hua Chuning, and the ruling Communist Party newspaper, urging the United States to publish the details of the athletes and allow an investigation into a military lab near Washington.
Beijing’s commitment to the ultimate theories about COVID-19 is part of China’s growing efforts to divert criticism on issues ranging from pandemics to human rights, experts and diplomats say.
The prevailing opinion among scientists is that COVID-19 originated in China, probably through the wildlife trade, although the theory that the virus was released by a laboratory in Wuhan has recently attracted increasing attention.
Beijing’s aggressive strategy, while popular at home, suggests it may abandon improving relations with the West, experts say.
“They tell the rest of the world that they stand up for their interests. I’m sure that has a good response at home,” said Bonnie Glaser, an Asia expert at the German Marshall Fund.
She is unsure of the diplomatic purpose of such behavior: “Perhaps they want to signal very clearly to the United States – ‘your approach is not working, try something else.’
Asked about China’s strategy, Hua said on Friday that Beijing is ready to develop friendly relations with every country, including the United States, subject to mutual respect. But that China will not smile and swallow when it is slandered in the United States.
© Associated Press
– Hua Chuning, director of the information department of the Chinese Foreign Ministry
After seven months in power, President Joe Biden has largely maintained his predecessor Donald Trump’s line of confrontation with China. The summits between the two countries did not seem to bring anything more than bad feelings. In Tianjin last month, both sides set conditions without negotiations after China accused the United States of creating an “imaginary enemy.”
Investigate the Americans, not China
In China’s highly controlled media environment, there has been a narrative that the country is “besieged on all sides,” said Rana Mitter, a professor of Chinese history and politics at Oxford University.
China ridiculed the theory that COVID-19 was inadvertently dropped by the state virology laboratory in Wuhan. A version backed by Republicans in Congress, but not by US intelligence agencies. Instead, Beijing raises the idea that the virus escaped from a laboratory in Fort Detrick, Maryland, in 2019.
In countering allegations of genocide against predominantly Muslim Uighurs in the western region of Xinjiang, China has adopted slogans such as “Black life matters.”
Chinese diplomats are increasingly mentioning human rights and Fort Detrick in public comments, according to a Reuters review, citing the message that Western countries have no right to criticize, but should be investigated instead.
Some observers noted President Xi Jinping’s more peaceful tone when he called on China in May to “fight” for international public opinion while becoming “more beloved.” Instead, his diplomats stepped up the attacks.
“It’s nagging, and I think they’re doing it because they don’t have other, more effective strategies. If it turns out that COVID-19 came about as a result of mistakes made by Beijing, it’s going to put China in a very bad light.” says Bonnie Glaser,
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Supported by diplomats and state media, more than 25 million Chinese have signed a petition to the World Health Organization (WHO) asking them to investigate the laboratory in Fort Detrick, which closed in August 2019 due to safety concerns.
Asked for comment, the WHO cited a statement on the origins of COVID-19, calling on “all governments to depoliticize the situation”. The laboratory in Fort Detrick did not respond to a request for comment, but told US media that there was no leak.
This week, China took advantage of the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan as proof that the United States has no right to talk about human rights.
China, which has traditionally opposed pointing fingers at the UN Human Rights Council, began doing the same this year, a Western diplomat in Geneva said.
“This beating in the chest is intended for the local audience, but it also makes more sense to seek wider support with different rhetoric,” he added.
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Some Western diplomats say China’s aggression is counterproductive and that it is not clear to which audience it is addressed.
“It was like a smokescreen,” a senior diplomat in Geneva told Reuters. “It was very pathetic and reciprocal.”
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