Chinese Ambassador to the United States Tsui Tiankai called on Washington to drop the accusations against Beijing regarding the alleged concealment of the origin of the coronavirus and the scale of the epidemic.
China supplied more than 4 billion medical masks to the United States during the spread of the new coronavirus disease pandemic. China’s Ambassador to the United States Tsui Tiankai said in an article for The Washington Post on Wednesday.
“As of April 29, according to our customs service, China has supplied more than 4 billion masks to the U.S., or roughly speaking, 14 masks on average for each American”, – said the Chinese diplomat.
At the same time, he once again called on the U.S. authorities to abandon accusations against China regarding the alleged concealment of data on the origin of coronavirus and the scale of the epidemic.
“When China quarantined the city of Wuhan [where the coronavirus began to spread], critics called the move a medieval method that violated human rights and a typical behavior of “authoritarian” China. When China provided new data on the epidemic, they called it misinformation and propaganda <…> When the situation in China improved, the number of coronavirus infections and fatalities increased rapidly around the world, and immediately some American politicians became accusing others, ignoring the fact that China did everything possible to contain the virus”, – the diplomat said.
According to Cui Tiankai, “China was accused of supplying poor quality medical equipment, but when measures were taken to improve product quality, the country was criticized for stockpiling and delaying exports of this type of goods.”
“The World Health Organization (WHO) praised China’s fight against the pandemic, which gave rise to conspiracy theories that China either bought or is exerting political pressure on WHO”, – the representative stressed.
However, the ambassador said the facts are that China ‘made serious efforts’ to contain the virus, issued timely warnings about the nature of the pandemic and ‘shared information with the United States’. “On 27 December, the first three cases of coronavirus infection were recorded in Hubei province.”
“Over the next four days, the central government and local administration conducted an investigation. A week later, on 3 January, China began alerting WHO, the United States and other countries about the outbreak. On 12 January, China disclosed the coronavirus genome sequences, a key element in the diagnosis and treatment of the disease around the world”, – the diplomat wrote.
In addition, the topic of combating the epidemic was also raised during the telephone conversations of Chinese President Xi Jinping with U.S. President Donald Trump.