China should allow inspections into sensitive labs to collect facts on COVID-19 origin: Pompeo

WASHINGTON:

United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, while voicing concerns over the origin of coronavirus pandemic, has said that China should allow the inspections into their sensitive labs to investigate reasons of deadly virus leak.

Pompeo’s statement came after China denied the allegations by the United States President Donald Trump that the deadly virus was developed in a laboratory in Wuhan, China.

“You have to remember — these labs are still open inside of China these labs that contain complex pathogens that were being studied. It’s not just the Wuhan Institute of Virology,” Pompeo said in a news briefing. “It’s important that those materials are being handled in a safe and secure way such that there isn’t accidental release.”

The US Secretary of State also claimed that the COVID-19 virus sample was not shared with Washington after repeated requests.

“We still do not have a sample of the virus, nor has the world had access to the facilities or other locations where this virus may have originally originated inside of Wuhan,” Pompeo said.

The World Health Organisation (WHO), while rubbishing all the impressions about Novel Coronavirus originating from a lab in Wuhan, China, has said that the available evidence suggested the virus originated in bats in late 2019 and was not made in any laboratory.

“All available evidence suggests the virus has an animal origin and is not a manipulated or constructed virus in a lab or somewhere else,” WHO spokeswoman Fadela Chaib said during a news briefing here on Tuesday. “It is probable, likely that the virus is of animal origin.”

The comments by WHO official came days after President of the United States (POTUS) Donald Trump said that the country’s intelligence community was examining whether the newly-emerged virus developed accidentally from a Wuhan lab.