In a shocking revelation, top military officials and scientists from China considered weaponizing SARS Coronavirus in 2015, almost 5 years before the actual pandemic originated. The report comes from The Sun newspaper from UK.
Through this confirmation, the conspiracy theorists across the world that questioned China’s intent are thumping their chests. The reason is that these conspiracy theorists questioned China’s intent and believed that the major superpower could indeed cause harm to the world economy by unleashing a deadly virus.
Background
Earlier last year, the Chinese authorities actually allowed health experts to visit Wuhan Institute of Virology lab. China’s intent to do so was simple: curb all the conspiracy theories that the COVID-19 causing SARS-CoV-2 virus was originated in the lab.
China in its regular fashion of exerting all the control over the probe, interfered with the process. Finally, in March 2021, WHO scientists confirmed that there were no evidences that indicated the virus was leaked in the lab.
However, the recent revelation does raise a lot of questions on the intent of China and the power it wields to be even considering a deadly plan of action such as weaponizing a deadly virus.
Also read: No evidence that COVID-19 virus was ‘leaked’ in Wuhan lab: WHO Experts
Details
According to a recent report by ‘The Sun’, which quoted an initial report released by ‘The Australian’, the US State Department allegedly obtained documents that indicate how the top officials of China’s PLA (People’s Liberation Army) considered the aspects of turning SARS CoV-2 as a weapon.
The documents were penned down by Chinese public health officials and top-grade military scientists way back in 2015. The documents were actually China’s probe into COVID-19’s origins and its implications.
SARS virus a “new era of genetic weapons”
According to reports, the Chinese military scientists labelled the SARS-CoV-2 VIRUS – which is the cause of COVID-19 – as a “new era of genetic weapons”. To those who may not know, the coronavirus is part of a large umbrella of viruses. Although most of them are controllable and not fatal, there are several viruses that may cause infectious diseases harming respiratory system of humans.
Bioweapon could cause enemy medical system to collapse
The documents also referenced to the idea that the viruses could indeed be “artificially manipulated into an emerging human disease virus, then weaponized and unleashed in a way never seen before”. The People’s Liberation Army (China’s army) document also stated how an attack with such a bioweapon could cause “enemy’s medical system to collapse”.
It should be noted that the document actually had names of some of the biggest public health and disease experts from China.
Australia antagonized by new revelation
With such a revelation, it is obvious that countries are now feeling antagonized by the intent of China. James Patterson from Australia said how the document raises questions on China’s way of dealing with COVID-19 and its lack of transparency as well.
Another Australian politician named Tom Tugendhat was quoted in ‘The Sun’ report saying, “China’s evident interest in bioweapons is extremely concerning. Even under the tightest controls these weapons are dangerous. “
Peter Jennings, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s (ASPI) Executive Director was quoted by news.com.au saying how the document is like a
“smoking gun. Jennings in his interview also said, “I think this is significant because it clearly shows that Chinese scientists were thinking about military application for different strains of the coronavirus and thinking about how it could be deployed. It begins to firm up the possibility that what we have here is the accidental release of a pathogen for military use.”
“If this was a case of transmission from a wet market it would be in China’s interest to co-operate … we’ve had the opposite of that,”
-he further added.
Cybersecurity expert confirms legitimacy of documents
To check the authenticity of the documents, Robert Potter was called. Potter is a cyber security expert who has relevant experience in verifying high-profile documents. Potter said how he and his team reached a high confidence conclusion on the fact that the documents were not fake. Potter also said that now that the world has got its hands on the documents, China will try to remove it.
“It emerged in the last few years … they (China) will almost certainly try to remove it now it’s been covered,”
-he reported to news.com.au.
China retaliates, slams The Australian newspaper
As anticipated, China’s state-run newspaper Global Times came down hard on The Australian for publishing an article that questioned China’s intent.
“It is a shame for anti-China forces in Australia to back their own ideology against China at the expense of basic professional journalistic ethics.” Chen Hong, a China based professor said.
