Joe Biden demands report of information on origins of Covid-19 within 90 days
The American president called on Wednesday, May 26, the American intelligence services to redouble their efforts to explain the origin of the Covid-19.
Nicholas Kamm AFP / File
Text by: RFI Follow
3 min
Joe Biden called on Wednesday, May 26, the American intelligence services to "
redouble their efforts
" to find the origin of the Covid-19.
Long brushed aside by most experts, the theory of a laboratory accident in Wuhan, China, has come back in force in recent weeks in the American debate.
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With our correspondent in the United States,
Éric de Salve
In recent weeks, Joe Biden had already asked American intelligence to answer the question facing the whole world: what is the origin of the coronavirus?
Has Covid 19 been transmitted naturally from animals to humans or is it, on the contrary, the result of a laboratory accident in China?
In their first report, the American agencies failed to decide.
Dissatisfied, Joe Biden therefore calls on them to "
redouble their efforts
" and therefore gives them 90 days to provide him with a second report with the official mission of "
bringing us closer to a final conclusion
" on these two scenarios qualified as probable by the House. White.
"
Put pressure on China
"
This terminology confirms the change in approach of the Biden administration, which now considers the theory of an accident at the Wuhan Institute of Virology as credible as the Trump administration believed. In his press release Joe Biden points directly to Beijing: "
The United States,
writes the president, will
continue to work with their partners around the world to put pressure on China so that it takes part in an international investigation, complete and transparent, and evidence-based.
"
A few hours before the release of the US president's
press
release, Beijing accused Washington of spreading “
conspiracy
”
theories
on the origins of the pandemic. China has always fiercely fought the theory that Covid-19 could have escaped from one of its laboratories, in particular the Wuhan Institute of Virology, singled out by the Trump administration. But this week, a
Wall Street Journal
(WSJ)
article
reignited speculation in the country. In March, after a four-week stay in Wuhan in early 2021,
a joint study by WHO and Chinese experts
had deemed
a laboratory accident
"
extremely unlikely
".
►Also read: Origins of Covid-19: scientists call for a new investigation
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United States
Joe biden
Coronavirus
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