Beijing’s Deadly Lies

China’s government engaged in an “assault on international transparency” to the “endangerment of other countries,” concludes a report by the Five Eyes intelligence consortium of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States.

In other words, it’s not just the Trump administration making that case, as much of the US media would have you believe: It’s the intelligence pros of this country and some of its closest allies, some of them led by left-of-center politicians.

Australia’s Telegraph got the 15-page document detailing Beijing’s deliberate suppression of evidence, including: “disappearing” doctors and scientists who tried to sound the alarm; destroying proof at genomic-studies labs; and “bleaching of wildlife market stalls.” It also notes the regime’s “deadly denial of human-to-human transmission” when it knew the disease was spreading between people.

And China’s stonewalling: It’s denying repeated international requests for a live virus sample from the first corona cases. That would help researchers working on a vaccine — and maybe shed light on where and how the virus originated. Nor will it let in foreign experts to examine those origins.

Want more? An investigation by Canada’s Global News found that China secretly told embassies around the world to buy all personal protective equipment possible — in mid-January, when it knew the virus would likely go global.

The regime used diplomats, state-owned companies and Chinese émigrés to purchase N95 masks and other gear to ship “back batches of scarce supplies for the motherland.” About 100 tons shipped out of Canada alone — leaving that country with limited supplies when the pandemic hit.

That investigation backs up this week’s US Department of Homeland Security intelligence finding that China “intentionally concealed the severity” of its corona crisis in January so it could stock up on medical supplies from abroad — which it also lied about, covering up trade data.

Beijing’s response to the overwhelming evidence that it lied — and so multiplied the global death toll — has been laughable. In a Washington Post op-ed Tuesday, Cui Tiankai, the Chinese ambassador to America, insisted: “It is time to end the blame game.”

Right — end it China’s rulers come in for their due.