China says it has been ‘open and transparent on COVID’

BEIJING (AP) — China said Tuesday it had been “open and transparent” in researching the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic and dismissed criticism from the United States for politicizing the issue.

China has “disclosed most of the data and research findings and made important contributions to global research to trace the virus,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning Mao told reporters.

“Politicizing the issue of virus tracing will not tarnish China, but will hurt the credibility of the United States,” Mao said in response to complaints from U.S. officials and lawmakers that China has not fully cooperated.

Meanwhile, questions are mounting about how the virus that has killed more than 6.8 million people around the world originated.

The Ministry of Energy recently assessed with “low confidence” that the pandemic first detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019 began when a virus escaped from the lab. This report has not been published.

Others in the US intelligence sector disagree, citing differences of opinion within the government. “There just isn’t a consensus in the intelligence community,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Monday.

The Wall Street Journal was first to report the Energy Department’s finding over the weekend, saying the confidential report was based on new information noted in a 2021 document update. The department oversees a network of laboratories in the country.

White House officials on Monday declined to confirm media reports of the assessment.

In 2021, a summary of an intelligence report was released that said four members of the intelligence sector believed with low confidence that the virus was first transmitted from an animal to a human and another believed with moderate confidence that the first contagion to a human being was laboratory related.