China demands investigation of "US military Fort Detrick laboratory" in COVID origin probe

Letter signed by nationals submitted to WHO... Claims of COVID-19 link with lab closure timing
Discomfort over WHO Director-General mentioning Wuhan lab audit

[Asia Economy Beijing=Special Correspondent Jo Young-shin] China has launched a public opinion campaign, suggesting that if the US military's Fort Detrick laboratory must be investigated in relation to the origin of COVID-19, it should be done. When Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), mentioned the necessity of a second phase investigation into the origin of COVID-19 in China and an audit of the Wuhan laboratory, China appeared to counter by bringing up the investigation of the Fort Detrick laboratory.

China's state-run Global Times reported on the 19th that a letter signed by more than 500,000 Chinese people was submitted to the WHO, stating that the US military's Fort Detrick laboratory should be included in the COVID-19 origin investigation. The Fort Detrick laboratory is known as the site where the US military's biological weapons program was once conducted and was temporarily closed in 2019.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

The letter claimed that some of the world's most deadly and highly contagious viruses, including Ebola, smallpox, SARS, MERS, and new coronaviruses, are stored at the Fort Detrick laboratory, emphasizing the need for a thorough investigation of the facility.

It also alleged that there was a leak incident at the laboratory around the fall of 2019, and that the US has not disclosed accurate information about the leak, citing national security as an excuse. The letter raised suspicions that the new coronavirus might be related to the US laboratory. It further pointed out that evidence of COVID-19 infection in the US was found in June last year, prior to the first recorded COVID-19 infection in the US in December 2019. It added that the first confirmed COVID-19 patient in Wuhan, China, was on December 8, 2019.

Regarding this, Zheng Guang, Chief Epidemiologist at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said, "WHO experts visited China and conducted an investigation of the Wuhan laboratory, concluding that there was no evidence of a laboratory leak." He added, "Since the US has the largest number of biological laboratories in the world, the next WHO investigation into the origin of COVID-19 should be conducted in the US." He also noted that despite the US having over 600,000 cumulative COVID-19 deaths, it has not allowed an investigation of the Fort Detrick laboratory.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

China also expressed discomfort toward WHO Director-General Ghebreyesus. It is known that Ghebreyesus stated in a confidential briefing to member states the day before that a second phase investigation into the origin of COVID-19 requires an audit of the Wuhan laboratory and further study of the Wuhan animal market. In a previous public briefing, he said, "It is necessary for Chinese authorities to provide initial COVID-19 related data," and "It is too early to completely rule out a laboratory leak in Wuhan." The WHO had previously assessed in a report released in March that the possibility of COVID-19 originating from a laboratory was "extremely low."

The Global Times criticized Ghebreyesus for not respecting the report results from WHO experts who visited China and investigated, evaluating that he succumbed to political pressure from a minority of member states led by the US.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.