China lambasted suggestions that it hid information about the coronavirus outbreak, saying in a newly published white paper that it has acted transparently and informed the world of developments in a timely manner.
"Some foreign politicians and media have presumed guilt for the origin of the virus, put labels on the virus and politicized the epidemic,” Xu Lin, head of State Council Information Office, said at a briefing in Beijing Sunday. "The fabricated assumptions — like the ‘China origins of the virus,’ ‘China concealed the virus’ and ‘it’s China’s responsibility’ — are utterly baseless, unreasonable and disrespectful of science.”
With almost 400,000 deaths globally, the COVID-19 pandemic has become a point of tension in China’s relationship with a number of countries, most notably America. President Donald Trump has repeatedly faulted China for having failed to contain the coronavirus when addressing the outbreak in the U.S., which now leads the world in both infections and deaths.