ANALYSIS
The American threat was too strong. Very criticized by the United States, Donald Trump at the head, the World Health Organization resolved Tuesday to accept the principle of an investigation into its management of the coronavirus pandemic. This "independent assessment", the contours of which remain unclear, however, marks the last episode of a veritable diplomatic saga. Accused by the American president of being subservient to China, the WHO, and in particular its president, the Ethiopian Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, find themselves at the heart of the standoff between Beijing and Washington, in the struggle for world leadership. Story of these months of crisis, which placed the UN agency in the eye of the storm.
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Act 1: WHO declares global health emergency, a month after the first cases in Wuhan
On December 31, 2019, China revealed the existence of an outbreak of pneumonia in Wuhan, in the Chinese province of Hubei. The following day, WHO activated a crisis management cell at its headquarters in Geneva, "placing the organization in emergency mode". In a few weeks, the pandemic progresses quickly and begins to contaminate the neighboring countries of China, including Thailand, South Korea and Japan.
Meanwhile, the UN agency convenes an emergency committee, which can not agree on whether to trigger a "public health emergency of international concern". It was not until January 28, six days after the first meeting of this emergency committee, that a WHO delegation, led by its boss Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, left for China.
On the spot, the WHO and the Chinese president Xi Jinping agree to dispatch an international team of scientists. Finally, on January 30, the UN agency declared the epidemic of the new coronavirus "a public health emergency of international concern". Almost a month after the reports by China of the first cases on its soil.
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Act 2: an agency accused of being under the influence
The pandemic therefore spreads all over the world, and begins to mourn Europe. Donald Trump, who initially praised China for its fight against the coronavirus, is starting to raise its voice with Beijing.
In mid-February, the American government was annoyed publicly by the Chinese authorities' "lack of transparency", marking the start of a diplomatic war between the two superpowers. WHO, for its part, stands up for China. "We have a government which cooperates with us, which invites international experts, which has shared sequences (of the virus), which continues to work with the outside world", even assures, in response, the head of the health emergencies department of WHO, Michael Ryan.
Except that the more the weeks pass, the more the criticisms against China arise, and not only in the United States. President Emmanuel Macron himself estimated in mid-April that there are "obviously things that we do not know" about the management of the pandemic by the Chinese authorities. In an article, Le Figaro even suspects Beijing of having influenced the WHO and accuses its boss, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesu, "of having taken up without language the elements of language of the Chinese Communist Party".
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Act 3: Donald Trump suspends the American contribution
On April 15, Donald Trump caused a diplomatic mini-earthquake. A week earlier, the American president had already sharply criticized the WHO, accusing him of being pro-Beijing. But the verbal contest then takes a step: he announces the suspension of the American contribution, the first donor of the UN agency with more than 400 million dollars per year.
These words immediately sparked diplomatic outcry, including from the United States' allies. The watchword, taken up in many capitals: no question of cutting off the WHO valves in the midst of a pandemic. "It is a shame, when there is a pandemic, that the only tool for global cooperation is in trouble. WHO is an important tool," deplores Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian. A boon for China, which announces in the process to give an additional 30 million dollars to the WHO, to compensate for the shortfall due to the American disengagement.
Act 4: an open investigation, and after?
In recent weeks, the United States has continued its undermining work. Monday, Donald Trump goes so far as to accuse the WHO of being "a puppet of China", and is evasive on his decision to permanently cut, or not, the valves to the UN agency. The following day, the WHO, cornered, must resolve, with the agreement of China, to accept the principle of an inquiry into its management of the crisis. The contours of this "evaluation" remain unclear, however. In the words chosen with care by the agency, it will have to sift through "the measures taken by the WHO in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic and their chronology".
But the diplomatic confrontation is not over yet. Russia, for example, denounced what it called American attempts to "break" the organization. China has declared itself open to an independent investigation ... but not before the end of the pandemic.