Pompeo tells Salena Zito the world must 'impose costs on China' for coronavirus

[Valin]

Washington Examiner

Salena Zito

May 17, 2020

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told the Washington Examiner that the world is going to have to “impose costs on China” for the coronavirus, and he said he has already presented a range of options to President Trump that would force the communist regime to compensate U.S. residents who have been harmed by the pandemic.

Pompeo made the comments in a Friday interview via phone from his office in the State Department, one day after a trip to Israel in which he put pressure on the U.S. ally to loosen its relationship with China.

“The world has to join together to impose costs on China until they change their behavior in a way so that they behave like a nation that is worthy of what they claim,” he said. “They claim they want to be a superpower, and yet, they behave in a way that's inconsistent with the duties they have not only under the World Health Organization regulations, but just as good members of society, to share data and to be transparent.”

He said, “Then, when those two things are accomplished, then the president will make a decision about what is the best way to approach making sure that China understands the consequences of the actions that it undertook and an effort to provide compensation to those here in the United States that have been harmed.”

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[Valin]

Chinese Official Confirms That China Ordered Labs To Destroy Coronavirus Samples

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had accused Chinese officials of ordering the samples’ destruction as part of the regime’s cover-up of the coronavirus outbreak in its early stages.

Peter Hasson

May 17, 2020

A senior Chinese government official confirmed Friday that authorities ordered laboratories to destroy samples of coronavirus in early January.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had accused Chinese officials of ordering the samples’ destruction as part of the regime’s cover-up of the coronavirus outbreak in its early stages.

Pompeo said on April 22 that China “censored those who tried to warn the world, it ordered a halt to testing of new samples, and it destroyed existing samples.” He offered more specificity on May 6, stating that China’s National Health Commission [NHC] ordered virus samples destroyed on Jan. 3.

NHC official Liu Dengfeng conceded at a briefing on Friday that the agency had ordered the labs to destroy the samples, but said that the order was given for safety reasons.

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Safety Reasons, being if Liu Dengfeng made the leadership of the PRC look bad they might be...reeducated?