America’s former top envoy today launched an astonishing attack on China over the coronavirus pandemic.
Ex-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tore into Beijing’s handling of the Covid crisis, suggesting President Xi Jinping could be guilty of gross negligence manslaughter.
Claims have lingered that an accidental leak from a laboratory in China may have been responsible for the initial outbreak.
Beijing’s critics believe the cloud of secrecy which persists fuelled a cover-up that prevented international agencies being alerted sooner to the disease - and stopping them trying to contain the virus in China.
Scrutiny has focused on the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where viruses linked to bats were studied.
An estimated 6.3 million people have died worldwide from coronavirus, with the disease also ravaging economies.
“We know where this thing came from, precisely, and yet Xi has now permitted this virus - a virus that he knew was highly contagious and relatively lethal - and he put thousands of people on airplanes to Milan,” he fumed.
“If I was a good prosecutor I could get gross negligence and I could get at least what we call in the States ‘murder two’; six million people.”
Former British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt, who also served as Health Secretary, called for a “pandemic treaty” so countries can be honest with each other to lessen the impact of outbreaks.
He told the Institute for Government think tank: “Because of globalisation we are much more at risk to viruses that take root in any corner of the world, so I think it’s really important that we get better at picking up viruses that may be dangerous.
“I really like the idea … of a pandemic treaty where countries would agree to total transparency about all the viruses they’re discovering in their labs.
“It would be a smaller group of, probably democracies, who agree to that to begin with, but gradually over a 10, 15-year period we could get all countries to sign-up to it, and then we will be much better at spotting viruses earlier, because speed is everything.”
Mr Hunt hoped international cooperation on nuclear energy could provide a template for autocratic states to sign-up to such an arrangement.
“If it seems difficult to imagine China and Russia signing up to a pandemic treaty, let’s remember that both those countries have signed up to inspection frameworks for civil nuclear power, which means that even with all the mistrust there is now under the aegis of the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency), you can see American inspectors inspecting Russian nuclear power plants, Russian inspectors inspecting American nuclear power plants for safety.”
Speaking to the British think tank Policy Exchange, Mr Pompeo, he said the UK would need to help the US confront China in the coming years as Beijing boosts its military and aggression.
“It will take America to go lead a Pacific alliance to confront that and push back against that,” he warned.
“We’ll need some British help - you all have deep relationships in the region for many historic reasons and so there will be some element of capacity - you have intelligence services who I worked with, who have important capabilities there that we do not.”
He added: “It’s going to take a coalition of the willing. We will take the heavy lifting, the lead in trying to build that up, but we will need the UK support in doing that.”
