China urges US to invite WHO to probe roots of COVID-19 outbreak

On Wednesday, China urged the US to invite the World Health Organization to probe origins of the coronavirus outbreak there, as bickering over the pandemic continued after the WHO wound up its investigation in Wuhan.

The US said it wants to examine data used by the team, which concluded that the virus causing COVID-19 did not originate in a laboratory in Wuhan, and that bats remain a likely source.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told a regular daily briefing: “We wish that the US side can, like China, uphold an open and transparent attitude, and be able to invite WHO experts to the US to conduct origin tracing research and inspection.”

The origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, which first occurred in Wuhan in late 2019, are highly politicized, and China believes that the virus erupted outside its borders.