Coronavirus: China suspends the investigation into the origin of the pandemic

Will the origin of Covid-19 be revealed one day?

For now, research is at a standstill: China has strongly rejected the request of the World Health Organization (WHO) to conduct a new investigation on its soil.

The Asian country is accused by several states, with the United States at the head of the line, of having leaked the coronavirus from one of its laboratories located in Wuhan, at the end of 2019. An assumption violently criticized by Beijing.

This new investigation is a mark of "arrogance" or even "a lack of respect" according to Xi Jinping's regime. 

Wuhan Institute of Virology "never conducted research" on coronaviruses

On December 31, 2019, China revealed to the WHO the existence of an outbreak of unknown viral pneumonia on its soil.

A year and a half later, more than 4 million people have died from the coronavirus worldwide.

But it is still impossible to know where the virus came from.

Even though the first cases appeared in Wuhan province, President Xi Jinping's regime does not admit that the coronavirus is of Chinese origin and has even hinted that it could have been imported into the country.

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On the side of the WHO, the trail of the laboratory accident is gaining ground.

The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, last week requested an audit of laboratories in regions where the first cases of coronavirus have been identified.

The targeted laboratories are obviously located in Wuhan: the famous P4 but also several P3 laboratories.

Thursday, Beijing blasted this proposal and said it was "extremely surprised".

It reveals a "lack of respect for common sense and an arrogance towards science," Chinese Vice Minister of Health Zeng Yixin told reporters.

The Wuhan Institute of Virology "has never conducted research" on coronaviruses, he told reporters.

China accuses ... an American laboratory

Since then, the divorce between the WHO and China has been pronounced: Beijing refuses to continue the investigation initiated by WHO scientists into the origins of the pandemic.

The research began last February.

The international experts had judged "extremely unlikely" that the virus comes from a laboratory, privileging the track of a natural contamination by animals.

A conclusion questioned by Washington who accuses the head of the WHO of being too complacent with Beijing.

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China denies this and in turn criticizes a lack of transparency on the part of the United States. Chinese officials as state media point the finger in particular the laboratory of Fort Detrick near Washington, as being at the origin of the Covid-19. This site is at the heart of American research against bioterrorism. According to the

, a Chinese daily with a resolutely nationalist tone, 5 million Internet users had signed a petition on Wednesday for the opening of an investigation into Fort Detrick. The controversy is likely to be on the menu of the discussions that will have in China from Sunday the Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman, the highest American official to visit the country since the arrival of Joe Biden at the House -White.