Wuhan

China accused the U.S. of spreading "lies" and "conspiracy theories" after the Trump administration said it had new information suggesting the coronavirus might have emerged from a Chinese laboratory.

The goal of the WHO team is to start an investigation into the origin of the coronavirus at the place where it first appeared at the end of 2019.
However, the team of scientists immediately encountered obstacles, which followed up on a series of allegedly Chinese sabotages because China, it seems, is trying to control the investigation, Jutarnji list writes.

China recorded its first COVID-19 death in eight months on Jan. 14, as experts huddled to discuss worrying new strains of the coronavirus that are spreading rapidly around the globe.

The gathering in Geneva of the World Health Organization's emergency committee comes as their colleagues landed in Wuhan for a long-delayed mission to find the origins of the virus.

Two members were already on their way to that country, but one of them returned, while the other member is in transit in a third country. The WHO said that there was a problem with visas.
Beijing and the WHO, after months of negotiations, agreed on a long-awaited investigation in December.

The head of the World Health Organisation has said he is "very disappointed" China has denied its experts access to investigating the origins of coronavirus.

A Chinese citizen journalist was jailed for four years for her livestream reporting from Wuhan as the COVID-19 outbreak unfurled, her lawyer said on Dec. 28, almost a year after details of an "unknown viral pneumonia" surfaced in the central China city.

Global Times says coronavirus was imported into the Wuhan wet market from Australian beef steak and meat from Brazil and Germany.

Lately, however, China has been stepping up its media game and taking centre stage, surfing on the pandemic wave.

"The Chinese embassy in Slovakia has started an information offensive," the Slovak cyber security portal Infosecurity.sk noted last month.

China reported 11 new coronavirus cases on June 13, including six domestic cases in the capital that raised concerns about a resurgence.

Coronavirus may have been present and spreading in Wuhan as early as August last year, according to a study that analysed satellite imagery of car parks outside major hospitals and search engine data.