Daily Times

After the outbreak of coronavirus in Wuhan city of China in the third week of December 2019, the US considered the virus as China specific and did not foresee that it will spread so quickly to the whole world. According to the Independent dated 25 March 2020, the US took the virus as China’s virus as during Ministers of the G7, video conference, the US insisted on calling the coronavirus the “Wuhan Virus”. Mr Pompeo repeated claims that China concealed evidence of the virus, according to US News and World Report”.

The thinking that it was China’s virus, was very strange given the fact that this globalized world was so interconnected through air travelling, that spread of the virus in the world was quite likely. None of the country offered to assist China in fighting the coronavirus. It was only Pakistan, which displayed solidarity with China in fighting the virus and also offered its assistance.

However, when the virus spread to Europe and the US, while the US started blaming China for spreading the virus, the Europe was cooperating with China to contain the virus. According to the Independent newspaper, “the Chinese authorities have come under fire recently by the US over allegations that the government covered up cases of coronavirus during the early stages of the outbreak.

According to the Business Insider dated 16 April 2020, “The US is exploring the possibility that the novel coronavirus was accidentally released from a Chinese lab. President Donald Trump and Mike Pompeo made statements recently confirming that the government was investigating this angle. China has denied the theory”.

The thinking that it was China’s virus, was very strange given the fact that this globalized world was so interconnected through air travelling, that spread of the virus in the world was quite likely

According to Al Jazeera dated 16 April 2020, “The state-backed Wuhan Institute of Virology dismissed reports the virus may have been artificially synthesised at one of its laboratories or escaped from its facility. China’s foreign ministry stated, ” WHO officials “have said multiple times there is no evidence the new coronavirus was created in a laboratory”.

The US General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, also said that US intelligence indicated that the coronavirus probably occurred naturally, as opposed to being created in a laboratory in China, but that there was no certainty either way. Trump’s critics, meanwhile, see his latest statements as an attempt to “shift the blame”, as the outbreak in the US continues to grow.

According to the Asia News.It, dated 22 April 2020, lately Germany, France and the United Kingdom had started to press China for more transparency on what happened in Wuhan. German Chancellor Angela Merkel asked China to share more information on COVID-19. “China’s response to the outbreak has grey areas”, said French President Emmanuel Macron. The British parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee has warned that an orchestrated disinformation campaign by China is “costing British lives” in the fight against coronavirus.

According to the Strait Times, dated 20 April 2020, “Australia is demanding an international investigation into the origins of the virus and how it spread. While Japan’s initial policy was to cooperate with China to control COVID-19, the Print dated 14 April 2020 says that “the US allies Japan and Australia, have joined ranks to call out and penalise China for its inaction with regard to the Covid-19 pandemic”.

The above mentioned newspaper says, “Some Indian writers are also suggesting to India that it should join the Quad partners, the US, Japan and Australia against China in holding it responsible for spreading the virus. Rajagopalan of Nehru University, says,” It is in India’s interest to join its Quad partners against China as the China is responsible for the coronavirus disaster we are facing right now”.

The above discussion indicates that the US/western countries, Australia and India are blaming China for spreading the COVID-19 without any evidence, and it seems just a propaganda effort to cover their failures in fighting the virus effectively. Moreover, since China is now assisting the US, western countries, and many other countries of the world in fighting the virus, the critics of China are worried that it could excel others in its soft power projection in the world.

In other words, these critics are thinking in geopolitical framework and trying to contain China’s rising influence in the world due to its worldwide support to fight the COVID-19. In fact, by criticizing China by blaming it for spreading the virus, these countries are doing no good to the fight against COVID-19, rather they are harming this effort.

To fight COVID-19, and such pandemics in the hereafter, it is better that all countries of the world cooperate with, also involving China, and supporting each other in braving this virus, and its negative unimaginable economic fall out, which can prove disastrous for the poor nations of the globe. Therefore, G -7 and G-20 countries’ mutual cooperation in fighting the COVID-19, and alleviating its economic effects by providing financial assistance to poor economies would go a long way to succeed in containing the virus and virus related growing poverty in the world.

The writer is a former Consultant and Research Fellow of Islamabad Policy Research Institute (IPRI), Islamabad and Senior Research Fellow of Strategic Vision Institute (SVI), Islamabad