KARACHI: China has dismissed as ‘sensational hearsay’ suggestion by certain Western individuals and media outlets that novel coronavirus may have originated from China’s biological warfare program and it is a ‘bio-weapon’ leaked from a lab.
“Chinese people are fighting an all-out war against COVID-19 not just for its own sake, but also for global public health security. At this particular time, it is either with malicious intentions or absurd ignorance that certain individuals and media outlets are spreading such sensational hearsay,” Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Geng Shuang said during the weekly briefing on Friday. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has also said repeatedly there is no evidence that COVID-19 was engineered in a laboratory or created by the manufacture of biological weapons. More than 2,200 people have died in the outbreak originated from China last month. The WHO has warned nations could face a serious problem if they fail to “hit hard now” against the virus, which has infected more than 75,000 in China and over 1,100 abroad. Chinese authorities have placed tens of millions of people under quarantine in hard-hit central Hubei province and restricted movements in other cities far from the epicentre. – Agencies
