WASHINGTON, March 1 (Reuters) – The FBI has assessed that a leak from a laboratory in the central Chinese city of Wuhan likely caused the COVID pandemic, director Christopher Wray said on Tuesday, a -admits China says it has “no credibility whatsoever”.
“The FBI has long been investigating the origin of the pandemic as a potential lab incident in Wuhan,” Wray told Fox News.
His comments followed a report in the Wall Street Journal on Sunday that the US Department of Energy assessed with little confidence the pandemic that resulted from an unexpected leak in a Chinese lab.
Four other agencies, along with a national intelligence panel, still rule that the pandemic is likely the result of natural transmission, and two are undecided, the Journal reported.
White House national security spokesman John Kirby said on Monday that the US government has not reached a definitive conclusion and consensus on the origin of the pandemic.
China criticized Wray’s comments on Wednesday, saying it firmly opposes any form of “political manipulation” of facts.
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“Based on the bad track record of deception and deception by the US intelligence community, the conclusions they reached have no credibility whatsoever,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Mao Ning told reporters in Beijing.
“…We urge the US side to respect science and facts.”
Wray said he could not share many details of the agency’s assessment because they are classified.
He accused the Chinese government of “doing its best to try to suppress and obfuscate” efforts by the United States and others to learn more about the origins of the pandemic.
The virus was first identified in Wuhan in December 2019 before spreading worldwide and killing nearly 7 million people.
Reporting by Eric Beech; Editing by Dan Whitcomb and Nick Macfie
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
