China Refuses to Contribute to European Effort to Develop Wuhan Coronavirus Vaccine
Chinese envoy to the EU: “panic and blame games are not useful at all.”
China has refused to join the European effort to develop a vaccine against the Wuhan coronavirus, the Hong Kong-based newspaper South China Morning Post reported.
The European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm, hosted a donor conference on Monday, seeking funds to develop a coronavirus vaccine and treatments.
China, which was invited to the event, refused to make any financial promises or offered to collaborate on the coronavirus-related research effort. Beijing “made no new financial pledges, nor promised to make any successful vaccine a common public good,” the Hong Kong daily wrote. Instead of pledging assistance, the Chinese representative, Beijing’s ambassador to the EU Zhang Ming, accused the other countries of playing the “blame games” over the pandemic.
Germany, Norway, France, Britain, Italy, Japan, and Saudi Arabia pledged close to € 7.4 billion (over $8 billion) for “tests, medicines and a vaccine,” German weekly Der Spiegel reported. The United States is also making strides in finding a cure for the virus. The country might be able to roll out a vaccine against the contagion by the end of the year, President Donald Trump indicated. “We are very confident that we’re going to have a vaccine… by the end of the year,” Trump said on Sunday at a televised town hall event at the Lincoln Memorial.
The South China Morning Post reported Beijing’s rejection of the Europe-led effort:
The European Union’s effort to raise new funds for developing and distributing Covid-19 vaccines has met with a cold shoulder from China, despite the bloc’s success in almost reaching its US$8 billion fundraising target.
Not only was China the country that sent the lowest-level official to the online event on Monday, it also made no new financial pledges, nor promised to make any successful vaccine a common public good, as several participating countries have called for.
Instead, Chinese ambassador to the EU Zhang Ming asked the world to stop the “blame games” over the coronavirus. He also outlined existing Chinese efforts, such as commercial sale of protective equipment and masks, to needy countries. (…)
Zhang added that “panic and blame games are not useful at all” amid growing international calls – including from European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen – to investigate China’s role in the pandemic.
Of the 43 countries that participated on Monday, only China sent an ambassador, while the others sent a minister, a prime minister or president, or even the monarch, as in the case of Jordan’s King Abdullah II.
The Chinese remarks at the European summit about the “blame game” came after Sweden asked the EU to investigate the origin and the spread of the virus, which first appeared in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, home to the country’s high-security virus research lab.
“When the global situation of Covid-19 is under control, it is both reasonable and important that an international, independent investigation be conducted to gain knowledge about the origin and spread of the coronavirus,” Swedish Health Minister Lena Hallengren said on April 20.
China’s neighbors in the Asia Pacific, Australia, and New Zealand have also made calls for an international investigation into Beijing’s handling of the outbreak.
The US Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, backed those assertions on Sunday, saying that there was “enormous evidence” that the virus could have originated in a Chinese lab.
“There is enormous evidence that that’s where this began,” Secretary Pompeo told ABC’s This Week. “I can tell you that there is a significant amount of evidence that this came from that laboratory in Wuhan.” China was engaged in a “classic communist disinformation effort,” he added.
The mounting demands for an impartial probe into the coronavirus outbreak, which has so far infected 3.6 million people and killed over a quarter of a million people, have angered Communist China.
Beijing told the Australian government to retract its demand for an investigation into the outbreak or face a boycott of its goods in Mainland China. The regime even threatened to cut Europe’s medical supplies amid the pandemic after an official EU report concluded that China was running a massive disinformation campaign to cover up its liability for the global outbreak.
“The European Union toned down part of a report about Chinese state-backed disinformation because it feared Beijing would retaliate by withholding medical supplies,” the newspaper South China Morning Post, reported on April 25.
The Chinese intimidation campaign in the wake of the coronavirus shows how little the communist regime has changed more than four decades after the death of its founding father, and genocidal dictator, Mao Zedong. Thirty years after officially abandoning Maoism, Beijing’s ‘reformist’ mask is slipping once again, revealing its ghastly communist face beneath.
President Trump blasts China for covering up coronavirus outbreak
[Cover image via YouTube]
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Comments
Does this surprise anyone with a functioning brain?
Trump should make the central issue in the campaign waging a comprehensive campaign against the Red China menace–the platform should include total bar on imports of China, expropriation of Chinese government and nationals property and investments in the United States without compensation to defraud the costs of its virus; prohibition of the transfer of any technology to Red China; and the end of all visas for Red Chinese nationals. The last item would have a second benefit–denying funds from Red China students to universities such as Berkeley and University of Illinois that they rely upon to fund their hate-America policies
A bar on imports from China violates the rights of Americans.
And expropriating the property of Chinese nationals without compensation violates their constitutional rights, and would not be allowed by any court.
Ending visas for Chinese nationals would be constitutional; it would be illegal under current legislation but Congress could change that; but it would be completely unjustified.
If they’re foreign nationals and, presumably, not American citizens is there a concern about this?
.
Yes, of course it’s a concern. The constitution is the constitution regardless of whose rights are violated.
‘Yes, of course it’s a concern. The constitution is the constitution regardless of whose rights are violated.”
Nope, not if they aren’t US Citizens.
“A bar on imports from China violates the rights of Americans.”
Soviet Union.
Cuba.
Iran.
Among others.
What is special about communist China?
The Cuba sanctions are different because they were against a specific party (the Castro regime) that had stolen the property of US citizens, and were explicitly for the purpose of pressuring that party to return that property. So it was narrowly tailored to a specific law enforcement attempt.
In general, though, such sanctions do violate the rights of those Americans who would like to buy something from the sanctioned party, or to sell them something. Now when the sanctioned party is a hostile government that can be justified as an exercise of foreign policy. We tell our citizens that for the sake of a very important government objective we have to curtail their rights in this limited manner. Trading with the enemy. But how do you justify preventing Americans from trading with people who have done no wrong, and with whom we have no quarrel, just because we’re having an argument with their government?
We’re supposed to be the party of free trade, after all.
Unfortunately Millhouse, in this case the people is the government. We wouldn’t be barring goods made by the Chinese people, we would be barring goods sold by the Chinese government. Big difference.
“The Cuba sanctions are different…”
No they’re not. They are sanctions for specific reasons against an enemy of the United States.
You ignore the rest of the list because the list itself refutes your (wrong) assertion.
I’m not in your pathetic anti-American party.
Chinese nationals have no constitutional rights. Those are reserved for US citizens.
GitOffMahLawn: Chinese nationals have no constitutional rights. Those are reserved for US citizens.
That is incorrect. Under the U.S. Constitution, some rights are conferred only on citizens (such as the right to hold certain offices), but other rights, including due process, are inherent in persons.
Fifth Amendment: No person shall … be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.
Fourteenth Amendment: nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.
https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/constitution
“A bar on imports from China violates the rights of Americans.”
Poppycock. There are/have been bans on commerce with North Korea, Cuba, Iran, etc. WTF are you thinking?
“Ending visas for Chinese nationals would be constitutional; it would be illegal under current legislation but Congress could change that; but it would be completely unjustified.”
Again, Poppycock. Foreign nationals with citizenship of North Korea, Cuba, Iran are banned from obtaining visas. you bet the Executive Branch could issue such a ban.
i suspect, Milhouse, you were at the sauce early yesterday afternoon.
Then we need to change our laws, get it done promptly, while the horror of this is fresh.
Or maybe we should give China something in exchange, something with equal of greater consequences. Personally, I have always subscribed to at least a tenfold greater response.
Here’s the problem: “In 2017, 62 percent of all international students in graduate programs at U.S. institutions were enrolled in S&E [science and engineering] fields—69 percent of those came from China and India.” (American Affairs J., v. III, no. 9, Spring 2019)
And sadly, these are jobs American students do not want.
Pardon me but that should be ” that Americans are not educated enough to do.”
Students want what sparkes their imaginations. America needs to stop worshiping jocks, who are usually dull witted and in large part losers in every other area of life.
Do like some other countries, where academic excellence is recognized and promoted, rather than jockism.
the platform should include total bar on imports of China
The man in the street has no idea how much we get from China. We won’t even be able to buy extension cords if Chinese imports are curtailed. Dog food, nails, power resistors, memory boards, guitar pickups, paint brushes, hammers, BB guns, stethoscopes, saxophones, kitchen cutlery, car parts . . . civilization would grind to a halt without the vast array of Chinese goods. We’re surrounded by so much Chinese stuff that someone with some manufacturing experience can walk through a store, glance at retail prices, and make a pretty good estimate of the current dollar/renminbi exchange rate. I personally find that determination more reliable than US government inflation figures.
This situation can (and, I think, should be) reversed . . . but it won’t happen overnight, or anything close to it.
We can’t just cut off trade with them, even if it might be the best thing to do.
What we *can* do, however, is to ensure the incoming products are safe. As we have had a vast history of Chinese made products containing substandard, dangerous, or even toxic components, we need to ensure that all of them are now safe.
So, on imports from the region, check the materials, the paint, coatings, packaging…everything. Sorry about the time it takes…
Sweden and the EU damn well didn’t wait for the USSR to declare containment of reactor #3 at Chernobyl to launch an investigation. They got busy, and fast. They demanded immediate access to the damaged Chernobyl NPP. Scientists rallied in western Europe……
……
China is a gigantic virus power plant. The Wuhan reactor containment vessel failed and spewed metric tons of viral contagion…..
So what happens? EU leadership shrugs its shoulders while Europeans die. They hold a Jerry Lewis Telethon to fund virus research. They grouch about Trump and Hungarian nationalists. While the CCP laugh in the faces.
It was the best of times and the worst of times.
In the face of a possible epidemic, what would a Pres. Hillary Clinton have done? She would have consulted the WHO and called Xi for information. There would be no travel restrictions until later and if any..much smaller. Show me any other plausible scenario for how a Dem prez would have handled the pandemic other than the adoring manipulation of the news and facts by the press.
The one area of difference would be in the further transformation of the country with extended lockdowns and vote by mail to assure a one-party state…forever.
You could probably look at the earflapped fop’s pathetic non-reaction to the H1N1 and the tonguepath the kneepad media gave him for a fair approximation of how the wuhan flu virus would have been handled/covered under a dumbokrat.
I never buy Girl Scout cookies, band candy or sponsor walkathon participants. Maybe Xi has a policy against positive responses to door solicitors too.
I am willing to argue with Jehovah’s Witnesses, though. I cite a passage from Harold Bloom’s The American Religion.
If produced in China the vaccine would most likely cause covid-19.
Given the quality of those goods, is that a threat or a promise?
China has refused to join the European effort to develop a vaccine
Good. If they’re not involved it will be harder for them to sabotage it.
…but they would miss out on a chance to steal yet more western technology.
I imagine they believe they’ll be able to acquire stocks of the vaccine, so why bother paying for it?
I am confident that Trump will make a whole lot of noise about China’s culpability, but I am highly skeptical any lasting punishment will be implemented or survive. There is simply too much money at stake and it would take way more cooperation and serious leadership than we have. The US may as well get behind Chicom propaganda before promises to get retribution are broken.
“but I am highly skeptical”
Apparently you have not been paying attention to international business relationships pre chinaVirus.
Ok, please explain why I should believe that China will be made to pay for what they have done. Seems to me there will always be politicians talking big about turning the tables on China but never really doing anything.
Already answered. You need to study recent history with our China relationship.
I can’t think of a single reason why they would want to.
“Zhang added that “panic and blame games are not useful at all”
…Zhang then continued:
“But creating a ‘hyper flu’ like virus in secret, then stealthily spreading it around the world while at the same time buying up all PPE supplies worldwide, and finally having our paid for western media stir up a hysterical over the top response based on propaganda and mistruths – now THAT is useful. Very, very useful.”
“Ending visas for Chinese nationals would be constitutional; it would be illegal under current legislation but Congress could change that; but it would be completely unjustified.”
why unjustified?
Chinese nationals served as disease vectors for the wuhan flu, why wouldn’t the ccp do this again in future?
Illegal? No, you are mistaken:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/proclamation-suspension-entry-immigrants-nonimmigrants-persons-pose-risk-transmitting-2019-novel-coronavirus/
Tell Xi I said hello and to drop dead.