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Hiding Information: Pompeo Said China May Have Known about the Coronavirus in November

At an interview with the Larry O’Connor Show on April 23, Secretary of State Pompeo said that China may have known about the coronavirus “maybe as early as November, but certainly by mid-December.”

QUESTION: It’s been well documented that the State Department very early on, the first week of January, started putting out alerts, precautions about this mysterious virus in this Wuhan region of China. How soon were there official requests to the Government of China for information about this virus or perhaps a sample of the virus so that we could do research?

And a secondary question to that: Are those requests made directly to the Chinese Government or through the World Health Organization?

SECRETARY POMPEO: Those are great requests. Let me try and – really, three questions. They’re all important.

First, as soon as we came to have a concern about this, you’ll recall that the first cases of this were known by the Chinese Government in – maybe as early as November, but certainly by mid-December, and they were slow to identify this for anyone in the world, including the World Health Organization.

Once the United States came to understand what was potentially taking place there, we immediately turned both to the World Health Organization and to the Chinese Government directly, not just through the State Department but through our health and technical experts as well, and asked for access, for understanding, for transparency.

Frankly, Larry, we are still trying to get an actual sample of the virus. They have given us the breakdown of it.

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Source: State Department website, April 23, 2020
https://www.state.gov/secretary-michael-r-pompeo-with-larry-oconnor-of-the-larry-oconnor-show/

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Justice: People from Several Countries Sued China for Coronavirus Damages

As the novel coronavirus pandemic spread out globally, more and more people around the world have filed lawsuits against China for concealing the coronavirus information and causing the worldwide pandemic that has claimed many lives and hurt the economy badly.

#1: United States:

On April 21, the Missouri state government sued the Chinese government, saying that China’s response to the outbreak that originated in the city of Wuhan brought devastating economic losses to the state. It also accused the Chinese government of making the pandemic worse by “hoarding” masks and other personal protective equipment (PPE). It said that Missouri and its residents suffered possibly tens of billions of dollars in economic damages and seeks cash compensation.  (Reuters)

#2: Italy:

On April 21, the Oneurope non-profit organization launched a class action suit against China over COVID-19, claiming that China failed to react promptly according to obligations laid down by the World Health Organization (WHO). (Global Times)

#3: Italy:

The De La Poste hotel, a popular hotel in the Italian Alps, filed with a court in Belluno, which is in the same region, suing China’s Health Ministry for damages. The hotel sits in the town of Cortina d’Ampezzo, in the northern Italian region of Veneto, which was badly hit by the coronavirus. The hotel was heavily booked in March for the Ski World Cup Finals scheduled from March 18 to March 22, but then on March 12, the hotel was forced to close and stop all services when Italy went into lockdown. (The Mirror)

#4: India:

On April 14, Mumbai-based lawyer Ashish Sohani filed a petition in the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the Netherlands, suing Xi Jinping and four other officials for criminal negligence, willful suppression of information, and “treason against humanity.” It demands a total of $2.5 trillion compensation for the loss of lives and economic damage to the Indian government and the people of India. (Live Mint)

#5: Egypt:

Egyptian lawyer Mohamed Talaat filed a lawsuit via the Chinese embassy in Cairo, calling on China to pay $10 trillion due to the damages caused by the coronavirus in Egypt. Talaat based his claim on U.S. President Donald Trump’s comments that the virus originated in China and also media sources, which he did not name, that said China had produced the virus as a biological weapon. (Arab News)

#6: Israel:

On April 19, the Israeli Non-Government Organization (NG) Shurat HaDin announces that it plans to file a class action lawsuit against China in the coming days over its alleged negligence in treating and containing the coronavirus. The lawsuit was submitted in the US due to the fact that “most other countries are afraid of the implications of China’s economic might.” (Jerusalem Post)

Related postings on Chinascope:

1. Source: Reuters, April 21, 2020
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-china-lawsuit/in-a-first-missouri-sues-china-over-coronavirus-economic-losses-idUSKCN2232US

2. Source: Global Times, April 24, 2020
https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1186609.shtml

3. Source: The Mirror, April 22, 2020
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/coronavirus-hit-hotel-italy-ski-21905905

4. Source: Live Mint, April 22, 2020
https://www.livemint.com/mint-lounge/features/why-this-mumbai-lawyer-sued-china-for-2-3tn-over-the-coronavirus-outbreak-11587527832779.html

5. Source: Arab News, April 7, 2020
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1654456/middle-east

6. Source: Jerusalem Post, April 19, 2020
https://www.jpost.com/health-science/israel-us-law-firms-sue-china-for-trillions-of-dollars-over-coronavirus-625128

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Accountability: U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman and Myanmar Cardinal Held the CCP Accountable

#1: U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham told the Fox Television’s “Hannity” program that China should pay for its response to the coronavirus that enabled the contagion to spread around the world.

“If it were up to me, the whole world should send China a bill for the pandemic,” Graham said. “This is the third pandemic to come out of China and they come from these wet markets where they have bats and monkeys with the virus — carrying the virus — intermingled with the food supply. Yeah, I’d make China pay big time.” (Fox News)

#2: Cardinal Charles Maung Bo of Myanmar wrote an article to criticize the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for hiding the Wuhan Pneumonia epidemic information which led to the worldwide outbreak.

In his article, Cardinal Maung Bo stated that China hid the information from the Chinese people, which the international community was strongly against and it should be held accountable for legal and financial liabilities. He quoted the report from the University of Southampton that China could have reduced its infection count by 66 percent, 86 percent, or 95 percent, if it had taken proper actions 1 week, 2 weeks, or 3 weeks earlier. (Radio France International) (See Chinascope posting: Accountability: China Could Have Reduced the Coronavirus Infection Count by Two Thirds If Taking Actions One Week Earlier)

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Propaganda and Lies: Is Zhang Jingyi from Taiwan or from China?

Recently reporters from two Chinese Communist Party (CCP) controlled media attended a White House briefing and tried to hide their employer’s identity.

The first reporter was from Pheonix Television. (See Chinascope post: Propaganda and Lies: Background of Phoenix TV Whose Reporter Spoke for the CCP at the White House Press Release).

The second reporter is Zhang Jingyi. On April 8, 2020, Zhang Jingyi asked President Trump a question at the briefing. President Trump inquired where he was from. Zhang said “Taiwan.”

However, Zhang was not disclosing the full truth. He was from Taiwan, but he worked for Phoenix Television in 2010 and joined Dragon Television under the Shanghai Media Group which is one of the largest state-owned media and cultural conglomerates in China. In the context of President Trump’s question, he should have replied with the name of the company he is working for, which is the Shanghai Media Group.

The Taiwan Mainland Affairs Council spokesperson expressed that they will investigate Zhang’s case since his working for a state-owned media in China has violated the “Regulation on the Relationship between People from the Taiwan Region and the People from the Mainland,” which prohibits Taiwan citizens to taking positions in mainland China’s communist party, military, and political organizations.

Charlie Kirk (Founder and CEO of Turning Point USA) tweeted on April 17:

“How do agents of the CCP keep getting access to the White House Briefing Room? This “journalist” LIED to the president, said he was from Taiwan, but he is actually with Shanghai Media Group, a CCP propaganda arm RT if he should be arrested and deported!”

Trump responded to his tweet:

“Cut him off now!”

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World against the CCP: BILD Editor-in-Chief Response to Xi Jinping

On April 15, BILD, a German newspaper, published an article, ‘What China Already Owes Us,” presenting an “accounting” for the German “corona invoice,” (which the German government did not endorse and called “illusory”) with an amount of nearly €150 billion (US $163 billion) to China, including a €24 billion bill for lost tourism, €1 million per hour for Lufthansa and €50 billion for small businesses affected by the standstill.

The Chinese embassy responded with a furious letter which accused the paper of “stirring up nationalism” and prejudice towards China.

(reference #1)

Your report is not only missing crucial facts and exact timings but also any modicum of journalistic diligence and fairness.

Anyone who makes calculations like this is stirring up nationalism and prejudice as well as xenophobia and animosity towards China.

It does not live up to either the traditional friendship between our people or to a serious understanding of journalism.

Against this background, I ask myself where in your newsroom this dislike of our people and our country has come from?”

BILD editor-in-chief Julian Reichelt responded to the Chinese embassy’s accusation with an open letter addressed to Xi Jinping, titled “You are endangering the world”

(reference #2)

Dear President Xi Jinping

Your embassy in Berlin has addressed me in an open letter because we asked in our newspaper BILD whether China should pay for the massive economic damage the corona virus is inflicting worldwide.

Let me respond:

1. You rule by surveillance. You wouldn’t be president without surveillance. You monitor everything, every citizen, but you refuse to monitor the diseased wet markets in your country.

You shut down every newspaper and website that is critical of your rule, but not the stalls where bat soup is sold. You are not only monitoring your people, you are endangering them – and with them, the rest of the world.

2. Surveillance is a denial of freedom. And a nation that is not free is not creative. A nation that is not innovative, does not invent anything. This is why you have made your country the world champion in intellectual property theft.

China enriches itself with the inventions of others, instead of inventing on its own. The reason China does not innovate and invent is that you don’t let the young people in your country think freely. China’s greatest export hit (that nobody wanted to have, but which has nevertheless gone around the world) is Corona.

3. You, your government and your scientists had to know long ago that Corona is highly infectious, but you left the world in the dark about it. Your top experts didn’t respond when Western researchers asked to know what was going on in Wuhan.

You were too proud and too nationalistic to tell the truth, which you felt was a national disgrace.

4. The “Washington Post” reports that your laboratories in Wuhan have been researching corona viruses in bats, but without maintaining the highest safety standards. Why are your toxic laboratories not as secure as your prisons for political prisoners?

Would you like to explain this to the grieving widows, daughters, sons, husbands, parents of Corona victims all over the world?

5. In your country, your people are whispering about you. Your power is crumbling. You have created an inscrutable, non-transparent China. Before Corona, China was known as a surveillance state. Now, China is known as a surveillance state that infected the world with a deadly disease.

That is your political legacy.

Your embassy tells me that I am not living up to the “traditional friendship of our peoples.” I suppose you consider it a great “friendship” when you now generously send masks around the world. This isn’t friendship. I would call it imperialism hidden behind a smile – a Trojan Horse.

You plan to strengthen China through a plague that you exported. You will not succeed. Corona will be your political end, sooner or later.

Yours sincerely

Julian Reichelt

Related postings on Chinascope:

1. Source: Daily Mail, April 22, 2020
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8244487/China-blasts-Bild-newspaper-demanding-coronavirus-reparations.html

2. Source: BILD, April 17, 2020
https://www.bild.de/politik/international/bild-international/bild-chief-editor-responds-to-the-chinese-president-70098436.bild.html

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Hiding Information: Inner Mongolia Health Commission Trained People in January

The Epoch Times reported that it has obtained provincial documents from China that supported the evidence the Associated Press (AP) reported earlier: The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) knew of the severity of the coronavirus and the likelihood of person-to-person transmission on January 14, 2020; it passed down instructions to local health officials to take cautious measures immediately but did not disclose the information to the public until January 20, six days later. (See Chinascope post: Hiding Information: Document Showed the CCP Hid Information for Six Critical Days of Virus Containment).

The Epoch Times obtained eight documents from the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region (AR), which the government marked as secret, including the “Notice on Participating in the National Video Conference Training on the Novel Coronavirus Prevention and Control Work,” and the “Urgent Notice on the (Inner Mongolia) AR Video Conference Training on the Novel Coronavirus Prevention and Control Work.”

The documents showed that the government passed the coronavirus training from the central government down to local healthcare practitioners in teleconferences, but informed participants that the information in the teleconferences were “not allowed to be released to public.”

On January 15, the China’s National Health Commission held a confidential national teleconference with provincial health officials on coronavirus treatment. (AP reported the date as January 14, 2020).

On January 17, the Inner Mongolia Health Commission held an AR-level teleconference with the healthcare officials from the AR’s cities and Leagues (an administrative region under the Inner Mongolia AR, similar to Prefectures in the other provinces of China), to provide training on infection case identification and monitoring, management of suspected infectors and people who have had close contact with infected patients, the epidemiological investigation plan, the pneumonia laboratory test plan, etc.

On January 20, the Xilingol League Health Commission held a League-level teleconference with its own healthcare officials, to provide the related training.

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Infection Count: Several Places in China Showed Signs of Coronavirus Spreading Again

It is hard to get true coronavirus infection information from China as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) hides it from the public. Recently, information from media inside and outside of China seems to indicate that some places in China are facing the threat of the coronavirus outbreak again.

#1: Some provinces have treated Guangzhou and a few other Chinese cities as high risk regions.

  • On April 14, Hainan Province issued a “Notice on Strengthening the Prevention of Infection from Outside of the Province,” which listed Suifen City, Heilongjiang Province (a neighboring area with Russia); Manzhouli City, Inner Mongolia (also a neighboring Russia); and three cities in Guangdong Province including Jieyang, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen, as mid-level or high risk regions. In order to be allowed to enter Hainan, any people who traveled to these places in the past 14 days must provide a negative result of a coronavirus test, which must have been taken within the past seven days,.
  • People also received a computer notice when they bought airline tickets online that “people from Guangzhou or Wuhan coming to Yinchuan City, Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region (AR), will first be quarantined for 14 days in a centralized location.”
  • Some communities in Chengdu City, Sichuan Province posted a notice that people coming from “epicenters (Wuhan, Guangzhou, and overseas)” should register with the community management group and conduct self-quarantine at home for 14 days. (Oriental Daily)

#2: Wang Dingyu, a Legislative member of Taiwan, published a few documents from mainland China on his Facebook account warning of the danger of a second wave of the Wuhan Pneumonia which might occur in China. His documents showed that around mid-April:

  • Gaoqiao Town, Hong’an County, Hubei Province restarted temperature testing and disinfection throughout the town after a farmer resident was confirmed because of a coronavirus infection.
  • Businesses in Luo Village, Foshan City, and Guangdong Province entered lockdown management after an occurrence of group infection there.
  • Qiu County, Hebei Province also resumed its epidemic control measures. (Liberty Times)

#3: On April 10, Wuchang District Novel Coronavirus Prevention and Control Command Center issued a notice to search for any un-quarantined asymptomatic carriers, suspected infectors, confirmed patients, and people with close contacts with the confirmed patients, and to award 200 yuan (US $30) to people reporting information. (China Business Network)

#4: On April 15, Qinhuangdao City, Hebei Province held an education system meeting and decided to lock down all senior high school students and their teachers inside their schools for over 80 days until they finish the National College Entrance Examination, which is scheduled for July 7 and July 8 of this year. (United Daily News)

#5: In April, the Chongqing Health Commission issued a “Notice on Re-sending the National Emergency Medical Rescue Team” to 17 recipients, most of which were the major hospitals in Chongqing. The notice requires each institute to ensure that the team members, automobiles, and equipment are always ready in an “on-call” state and can be dispatched quickly. (Epoch Times)

#6: On April 1, Jia County, Henan Province announced the lockdown of villages and community neighborhoods throughout the county after three doctors at People’s Hospital were identified as asymptomatic carriers. (Apple Daily)

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