Cartoon produced by Xinhua shows US President Joe Biden turning to the intelligence community for a COVID-19 virus origins story. Photo: Xinhua

China urges the US to be a supporter rather than a destroyer of international cooperation on COVID-19 combat and studies on the virus origins and to listen to the voices of the international community, Chinese Foreign Ministry said following head of the Lancet COVID-19 Commission's calls on the US to work cooperatively with China. 

Wang Wenbin, spokesperson of Chinese Foreign Ministry, said at Monday's media briefing that some people in the US are politicizing the COVID-19 response and virus origins issue, and trying so hard to shift the responsibility for their failure to other countries. 

"Such irresponsible behavior has not only cost the American people dearly, but also become the biggest obstacle to international cooperation in fighting the epidemic and tracing its origins," Wang said. 

He said he hopes the US will listen to the objective and rational voice of the international community, to unite not confront with other countries, take responsibility and not shun it, let science lead instead of politics and support instead of destroying international cooperation on the fight against the pandemic and studies on the virus origins. 

Wang's remarks came after Professor Jeffrey Sachs, head of the Lancet COVID-19 Commission, said the US should "learn some good manners and work cooperatively with China, rather than trying to impose its will on that nation." 

"This is tragic, since China has done an excellent job of suppressing the pandemic, and the world could and should have learned a lot more from China's response," Professor Sachs was quoted by The Star as saying. 

Wang said that China immediately reported the epidemic to the World Health Organization (WHO) based on openness, transparency, science and cooperation, and shared its prevention and control and treatment experience with other countries without reserve, which bought precious time for all countries to respond to the epidemic. 

He said that China has twice hosted the WHO experts to China for virus origins research, and the China-WHO joint report has reached scientific and authoritative conclusions, laying a solid foundation for global tracing in the next stage.

Global Times