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- Published: April 20, 2020 20:46
New Delhi: United States President Donald Trump has said that the US wants to send a team of experts to China to investigate Corona virus.
He said this a day after he warned Beijing of consequences, if it was knowingly responsible for the spread of COVID-19 which has killed more than 1,65,000 people globally, including over 41,000 in America.
US suspects virus escaped from Wuhan Institute of Virology
Describing the Corona virus as a plague, President Trump, during his White House news conference, said that he is not happy with China where the pandemic emerged in December last year in the central Chinese city of Wuhan.
US has launched an investigation into whether the virus escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. He has repeatedly expressed disappointment over China’s handling of the Corona virus disease, alleged non-transparency and initial non-cooperation from Beijing with Washington on dealing with the crisis.
China rejects Trump’s demand
China on Monday firmly rejected US President Donald Trump’s demand to allow an American team into Wuhan to investigate the origins of the novel coronavirus, saying it was also a “victim and not a culprit” of the COVID-19.
Reacting to Trump”s comments, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told a media briefing here that “the virus is the common enemy for all mankind”.
“It may appear at anytime anywhere in the world. Like any other country, China is attacked by this virus. China is a victim instead of the culprit. We are not co-worker for this virus,” he said in a hard-hitting response to Trump’s plan to send a US probe team.
Over 41,000 deaths in US till now
The number of COVID-19 deaths in the US crossed 41 thousand and the total infections were more than 764,000 so far.
New York, the epicentre of the COVID-19 in the US, has 2,42,000 cases and over 17,600 fatalities so far. It has registered a 50 per cent decline in new cases over an eight-day period.
The Novel Corona virus, which emerged in China in December last year, has killed over 1,60,000 and infected more than 2.3 million people worldwide.