Taiwan protests WHO leader’s accusations of racist campaign

TAIPEI, TAIWAN -- Taiwan’s foreign ministry on Thursday strongly protested accusations from the head of the World Health Organization that the self-governing island was linked to and condoned racist personal attacks on him.

A ministry statement expressed “strong dissatisfaction and a high degree of regret” with WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus’ remarks at a press briefing in Geneva on Wednesday. It requested he “immediately correct his unfounded allegations, immediately clarify, and apologize to our country.”

At the press briefing, Tedros vocally defended himself and the UN health agency’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. He accused Taiwan’s foreign ministry of being linked to a months-long campaign against him and said that since the emergence of the new coronavirus, he has been personally attacked, including receiving at times, death threats and racist abuse.

“This attack came from Taiwan,” said Tedros, a former Ethiopian health and foreign minister and the WHO’s first African leader. He said Taiwanese diplomats were aware of the attacks but did not dissociate themselves from them. “They even started criticizing me in the middle of all those insults and slurs,” Tedros said. “I say it today because it’s enough.” The basis of his allegations was unclear.

President Tsai Ing-wen also weighed in, saying on Facebook that Taiwan does not condone the use of racist remarks to attack those with different opinions.

“If Director-General Tedros could withstand pressure from China and come to Taiwan to see Taiwan’s efforts to fight COVID-19 for himself, he would be able to see that the Taiwanese people are the true victims of unfair treatment,” she wrote, referring to Taiwan’s exclusion from the WHO at China’s insistence. “I believe that the WHO will only truly be complete if Taiwan is included.” Tedros was elected with the strong support of China, one of five permanent veto-wielding members of the UN Security Council and which claims Taiwan as its own territory. He has firmly backed Beijing’s claims to have been open and transparent about the outbreak, despite strong evidence that it suppressed early reports on infections, while echoing its criticisms of the U.S.