White House 'disappointed' in China's virus transparency
WASHINGTON, United States — The United States feels let down by
"We are a little disappointed that we haven't
Trump on Thursday again praised his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping for his government's response to the
But Kudlow said that unanswered questions were mounting and there was no sign of the promised cooperation.
"President Xi assured President Trump that China was on it and there would be openness, they would accept our help," he added.
"We're more than willing to work with the UN (and) WHO on this and they won't let us. I don't know what their motives are. I
"Is the Politburo really being honest with us?" he asked, referring to communist China's top leadership body.
Skepticism
But the government has faced continued skepticism among the global public. Criticism intensified after the death of a doctor who had tried to raise the alarm about the outbreak in December but
Trump told the Geraldo Rivera "Roadkill" radio program
"I think they want to put the best face on it," he said. "You wouldn't want to run out to the world, and go crazy and start saying whatever it is, because you don't want to create a panic."
"I think they've handled it professionally and I think they're
Contrary to Kudlow's description of Beijing's not allowing access, Trump said: "We're working with them. We're sending
Trump also repeated his belief that seasonally warmer weather in April could spell the end of the virus, a prognosis at odds with top US health officials who caution against commenting on the epidemic's trajectory.
"The April date is very, very important, because if that's the case, if heat does in fact kill, that's when it
Kudlow predicted that the economic impact would be "
"If we don't get good information out of China, it's very hard for us to make a decent assessment," he said.
Beijing's United Nations Ambassador Zhang Jun told the UN Commission for Social Development on Wednesday that China has "always adopted an open, transparent and highly responsible attitude" towards the epidemic.
"We have reported the epidemic information to the WHO, the relevant countries, and Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan regions as soon as it is available, shared the genetic sequences of the virus, actively communicated with other countries
Follow this page for updates on a mysterious pneumonia outbreak that has struck dozens of people in China.
New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins says on Sunday that he had contracted COVID-19, testing positive at a key point in his flailing campaign for re-election.
Hipkins saYS on his official social media feed that he would need to isolate for up to five days -- less than two weeks before his country's general election.
The leader of the centre-left Labour Party said he started to experience cold symptoms on Saturday and had cancelled most of his weekend engagements. — AFP
The World Health Organization and US health authorities say Friday they are closely monitoring a new variant of COVID-19, although the potential impact of BA.2.86 is currently unknown.
The WHO classified the new variant as one under surveillance "due to the large number (more than 30) of spike gene mutations it carries", it wrote in a bulletin about the pandemic late Thursday.
So far, the variant has only been detected in Israel, Denmark and the United States. — AFP
The World Health Organization says on Friday that the number of new COVID-19 cases reported worldwide rose by 80% in the last month, days after designating a new "variant of interest".
The WHO declared in May that Covid is no longer a global health emergency, but has warned that the virus will continue to circulate and mutate, causing occasional spikes in infections, hospitalisations and deaths.
In its weekly update, the UN agency said that nations reported nearly 1.5 million new cases from July 10 to August 6, an 80% increase compared to the previous 28 days. — AFP
The head of US intelligence says that there was no evidence that the COVID-19 virus was created in the Chinese government's Wuhan research lab.
In a declassified report, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) says they had no information backing recent claims that three scientists at the lab were some of the very first infected with COVID-19 and may have created the virus themselves.
Drawing on intelligence collected by various member agencies of the US intelligence community (IC), the ODNI report says some scientists at the Wuhan lab had done genetic engineering of coronaviruses similar to COVID-19. — AFP
Boris Johnson deliberately misled MPs over Covid lockdown-breaking parties in Downing Street when he was prime minister, a UK parliament committee ruled on Thursday.
The cross-party Privileges Committee said Johnson, 58, would have been suspended as an MP for 90 days for "repeated contempts (of parliament) and for seeking to undermine the parliamentary process".
But he avoided any formal sanction by his peers in the House of Commons by resigning as an MP last week.
In his resignation statement last Friday, Johnson pre-empted publication of the committee's conclusions, claiming a political stitch-up, even though the body has a majority from his own party.
He was unrepentant again on Thursday, accusing the committee of being "anti-democratic... to bring about what is intended to be the final knife-thrust in a protracted political assassination".
Calling it "beneath contempt", he said it was "for the people of this to decide who sits in parliament, not Harriet Harman", the veteran opposition Labour MP who chaired the seven-person committee. — AFP
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