Pompeo blames China for US COVID deaths

WASHINGTON (Reuters) — US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday renewed his aggressive criticism of China, blaming it for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people from the coronavirus and demanding again that it share information about the outbreak.

“They knew. China could have prevented the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people worldwide. China could have spared the world descent into global economic malaise,” Pompeo told a State Department news conference.

“China is still refusing to share the information we need to keep people safe.”

COVID-19 has killed more than 260,000 people worldwide, including more than 70,000 in the United States. The pandemic officially infected nearly 3.7 million, although with limited testing the number is believed to be far higher.

Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday the coronavirus pandemic has been worse for the United States than Pearl Harbor and 9/11 and renewed his criticism of China, saying the outbreak should have been stopped there.

Trump said fallout from the pandemic has hit the United States harder than the Dec. 7, 1941 Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor or the Sept. 11, 2001 al-Qaeda attacks on New York and Washington.

”This is really the worst attack we’ve ever had,” Trump told reporters at the White House.

“This is worse than Pearl Harbor. This is worse than the World Trade Center.”

The surprise Japanese attack on the Pearl Harbor naval base in Hawaii drew the United States into World War II. The 9/11 terrorist attacks killed about 3,000 people, triggering two decades of US wars and anti-terrorism operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries.

Trump lashed out at China, continuing a war of words over the origins of the deadly virus that emerged in Wuhan last year.”It should have never happened,” he said. “Could have been stopped at the source. Could have been stopped in China.”

The virus first emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan in December. Most experts believe it originated in a market there selling wildlife and jumped from animals to people, although Pompeo has said there is significant evidence it came from a laboratory.

Domestic critics of Trump, including some former officials, academics and columnists, have said that while China has much to answer for in terms of its actions in the early days of the outbreak, the US administration is seeking to deflect attention from what they see as a slow US response.

Pompeo pushed back against suggestions that he and other members of the Trump administration have issued conflicting statements about the exact origins of the novel coronavirus.

On Sunday, Pompeo said there was “a significant amount of evidence” the virus emerged from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, having said the previous Thursday it was not known whether it came from the lab, a so-called wet market, or some other place.

On Wednesday, Pompeo said the United States did not have certainty, but there was significant evidence it came from the lab.

“Every one of those statements is entirely consistent,” he said. “We are all trying to figure out the right answer. We are all trying to get the clarity.”

The Chinese state-backed Wuhan Institute of Virology has said the virus did not originate there.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a member of Trump’s Coronavirus Task Force, said in an interview published on Monday that the best evidence showed the virus was not made in a lab, but appeared to have “evolved in nature and then jumped species.”