Digital rights advocates reacted harshly Thursday to a new internal U.S. government report detailing how 10 federal agencies have plans to greatly expand their reliance on facial recognition in the years ahead.
Digital rights advocates reacted harshly Thursday to a new internal U.S. government report detailing how 10 federal agencies have plans to greatly expand their reliance on facial recognition in the years ahead.
The Government Accountability Office surveyed federal agencies and found 10 have specific plans to increase their use of the technology by 2023 — surveilling people for numerous reasons including to identify criminal suspects, track government employees’ level of alertness, and match faces of people on government property with names on watch lists.
The report was released as lawmakers face pressure to pass legislation to limit the use of facial recognition technology by the government and law enforcement agencies.
Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Rand Paul (D-Ky.) introduced the Fourth Amendment Is Not for Sale Act in April to prevent agencies from using “illegitimately obtained” biometric data, such as photos from the software company Clearview AI. The company has scraped billions of photos from social media platforms without approval and is currently used by hundreds of police departments across the U.S.
The bill has not received a vote in either chamber of Congress yet.
The plans described in the GAO report, tweeted law professor Andrew Ferguson, author of “The Rise of Big Data Policing,” are “what happens when Congress fails to act.”
Six agencies including the Departments of Homeland Security (DHS), Justice (DOJ), Defense (DOD), Health and Human Services (HHS), Interior and Treasury plan to expand their use of facial recognition technology to “generate leads in criminal investigations, such as identifying a person of interest, by comparing their image against mugshots,” the GAO reported.
DHS, DOJ, HHS and the Interior all reported using Clearview AI to compare images with “publicly available images” from social media.
The DOJ, DOD, HHS, Department of Commerce, and Department of Energy said they plan to use the technology to maintain what the report calls “physical security,” by monitoring their facilities to determine if an individual on a government watchlist is present.
“For example, HHS reported that it used [a facial recognition technology] system (AnyVision) to monitor its facilities by searching live camera feeds in real-time for individuals on watchlists or suspected of criminal activity, which reduces the need for security guards to memorize these individuals’ faces,” the report reads. “This system automatically alerts personnel when an individual on a watchlist is present.”
The Electronic Frontier Foundation said the government’s expanded use of the technology for law enforcement purposes is one of the “most disturbing” aspects of the GAO report.
“Face surveillance is so invasive of privacy, so discriminatory against people of color, and so likely to trigger false arrests, that the government should not be using face surveillance at all,” the organization told MIT Technology Review.
According to the Washington Post, three lawsuits have been filed in the last year by people who say they were wrongly accused of crimes after being mistakenly identified by law enforcement agencies using facial recognition technology. All three of the plaintiffs are Black men.
A federal study in 2019 showed that Asian and Black people were up to 100 times more likely to be misidentified by the technology than white men. Native Americans had the highest false identification rate.
Maine, Virginia and Massachusetts have banned or sharply curtailed the use of facial recognition systems by government entities, and cities across the country including San Francisco, Portland and New Orleans have passed strong ordinances blocking their use.
But many of the federal government’s planned uses for the technology, Jake Laperruque of the Project on Government Oversight told the Post, “present a really big surveillance threat that only Congress can solve.”
Biden called his Afghanistan Disaster an “extraordinary success.”
During Joe Biden’s speech regarding the Afghanistan Disaster, Biden said that the debacle was an “extraordinary success” despite effectively handing over billions of dollars worth of US military equipment to the Taliban, the abandonment of thousands of American citizens and military dogs, the deaths of 13 US service members, and the diminishing of American global standing.
In what could be described as one of the most defiant and tone-deaf reactions to an international catastrophe caused by a President in the history of the United States, Joe Biden declared in a speech today that his Afghanistan Disaster was an “extraordinary success.” This comes after billions of dollars worth of US military equipment, thousands of Americans, and hundreds of US military dogs were left behind in Taliban territory, as well as the tragic deaths of countless Afghan civilians and 13 American service members.
“The extraordinary success of this mission was due to the incredible skill, bravery, and selfless courage of the United States military and our diplomats and intelligence professionals,” said Biden.
Pres. Biden on U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan: "The extraordinary success of this mission was due to the incredible skill, bravery, and selfless courage of the United States military and our diplomats and intelligence professionals."https://t.co/Wfv8QKQBYUpic.twitter.com/CE4d6TSm6Y
However, many experts have referred to the botched withdrawal as a catastrophic failure. As a result, eleven Marines, one Navy hospital corpsman, and one Army staff sergeant were killed following the suicide bomb attack near the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul. 18 other US service members were wounded during the attack, National File previously reported.
Marine Corps Lance Corporal Rylee McCollum, age 20, Jackson, Wyoming
Marine Corps Lance Corporal Jared Schmitz, age 20, of Wentzville, Mo.
Marine Corps Lance Corporal David Espinoza, age 20, Rio Bravo, Texas
Navy Hospital Corpsman Max Soviak, age 22, Berlin Heights, Ohio
Marine Corps Corporal Hunter Lopez, age 22, Indio, California
Marine Corps Lance Corporal Kareem Mae’Lee Grant Nikoui, age 20, Norco, California
Marine Corps Staff Sergeant Darin Taylor Hoover, age 31, Utah
Marine Corps Corporal Daegan William-Tyeler Page, age 23, Omaha, Nebraska
Army Staff Sergeant Ryan Knauss, age 23, Corryton, Tennessee
Marine Corps Sergeant Johanny Rosario, age 25, Lawrence, Massachusetts
Marine Corps Corporal Humberto Sanchez, age 22, Logansport, Indiana
Marine Corps Sergeant Nicole Gee, age 23, of Roseville, California
Marine Corps Lance Corporal Dylan R. Merola, age 20, Rancho Cucamonga, California
To make matters worse, the Biden regime had left behind its contracted working dogs in Afghanistan to die, according to animal rights groups. “These brave dogs do the same dangerous, lifesaving work as our military working dogs, and deserved a far better fate than the one to which they have been condemned,” said Robin R. Ganzert, American Humane’s president and CEO. “It sickens us to sit idly by and watch these brave dogs who valiantly served our country be put to death or worse.”
As Americans see the Chinese Communist Party mocking the US over the Afghanistan disaster, viral videos of Taliban pilots flying in American military helicopters that were abandoned by Biden during the hurried withdrawal of American troops, or as they witness the President disrespectfully checking his watch during dignified transfer ceremonies for US soldiers slain in Afghanistan, they can only be reminded of the devastating impact that this moment has taken upon their hearts and minds. As the sister of fallen US Marine Rylee McCollum put it, “You can’t f**k up as bad as [Biden] did and say you’re sorry. This did not need to happen, and every life is on his hands.” (READ MORE: Mother of Fallen Marine Condemns Sleepy Joe, Says Biden Voters ‘Killed My Son’)
“I wanted my son to represent our country, to fight for my country, but I never thought that a feckless piece of crap would send him to his death and smirk on television while he’s talking about people dying, with his nasty smirk. The dementia-ridden piece of crap needs to be removed from office. It never would have happened under Trump.”
In January 2020, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced that it would donate $10 million to contain the spread of the coronavirus in China and Africa.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation closely cooperated with Beijing to enable the sale of Chinese-produced medications outside China, new emails have revealed.
The documents, recently released from the US-based National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) under Dr Anthony Fauci, were obtained by the American activist group Judicial Watch through a Freedom of Information Act request.
The emails contain a 5 September 2017 report by Ping Chen, an NIAID representative in China, who told her colleagues she attended a Gates Foundation meeting that “initially planned to talk about global malaria eradication efforts”.
The participants, however, “ended talking in general Chinese policies and the foundation’s current strategies in China – capacity building to help China raise its national standards and leverage China’s resources to help others”, according to Ping.
She mentioned the Gates Foundation providing funding for China’s National Medical Products Administration, previously known as China’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to appoint experienced Chinese-Americans who had worked at the US FDA to work in the Chinese agency.
Ping also claimed that the Gates Foundation “is working with the Chinese government” to promote Beijing’s medical clout in countries, including those in Africa.
“More specifically, it helps Chinese companies to gain pre-qualification on medications so that Chinese company-manufactured drugs can be sold outside China, helps the Chinese to establish bilateral collaboration with specific countries in Africa, teaches the Chinese how to do resource mobilisation, and helps raise China’s voice of governance by placing representatives from China on important international counsels as high level commitment from China”, the NIAID spokeswoman said.
The past few years have seen China expand its clout in Africa, with the US-based think tank Heritage Foundation claiming in a report last year that “Beijing likely has better surveillance access to Africa than anywhere else by having built or renovated at least 186 African government buildings”.
Separately in the email, Ping referred to a meeting with a group from the Global Virome Project (GVP), which aims to tackle “high impact viral epidemics and pandemics” and is partially funded by USAID [United States Agency for International Development].
“The head of the project, Peter Daszak of [the] EcoHealth Alliance, is an NIAID funded Pl [private investigator]. His collaborator at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) in China has done excellent work on coronaviruses in Chinese bat populations”, the NIAID representative noted.
Ping was apparently referring to WIV Deputy Director Shi Zhengli, a top Chinese virologist, who was dubbed “Bat Woman” by the Chinese media for her consistent work with bat coronaviruses and included in Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2020.
Shortly after the emails were released by NIAID, Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton demanded that the Gates Foundation “explain the government report about its assistance to and advocacy for China”. The organisation has yet to comment on the matter.
China Slams US Intel Report on COVID Origins
The emails come after the Chinese Embassy in Washington, DC, bashed a newly released US intelligence report on the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, claiming that the document does not have scientific credibility and incorrectly suggests that Beijing is hindering a global investigation into the origins of the deadly outbreak.
In the report, US intelligence agencies asserted that COVID-19 “was not developed as a biological weapon”, suggesting that Chinese authorities had no foreknowledge of the virus before the initial outbreak. However, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) still noted that both natural exposure and a laboratory-related incident “are plausible” causes behind the pandemic.
Beijing has repeatedly rejected Washington’s allegations that COVID-19 originated in a Wuhan lab, warning the White House not to politicise the issue. China also often refers to theories suggesting the coronavirus leaked from the US Army’s Fort Detrick base in Maryland, in 2019, insisting that Washington should invite World Health Organisation (WHO) experts to investigate Fort Detrick.
Late March saw the release of a WHO report that argued it is “extremely unlikely” the coronavirus escaped from a Wuhan bio lab. China recently rejected the WHO’s call “to work together” on the UN body’s second probe into the origins of COVID, insisting that the first probe was sufficient and that Beijing prefers scientific to political efforts to find out how “the worst pandemic in a century” started.
I don’t know about you, but this week, there are three major concerns I have with the state of our country.
First, the Biden administration’s disastrous and shameful withdrawal from Afghanistan, which resulted in the senseless loss of American and Afghan life in a horrific situation and has now left hundreds of our civilians and millions of dollars in U.S. gear at the mercy of the Taliban.
Second, the Gulf Coast has been hammered by Hurricane Ida, which caused significant damage, claimed at least four lives and left substantial damage in its wake.
Third, our president consistently displays concerning indications that his cognitive health is on the decline, and he’s the one who we’re supposed to be able to reply upon to lead our country amid such crises.
There are times that Joe Biden’s unsettlingly frequent senior moments have appeared humorous, or perhaps infuriating, to those who did not support his candidacy.
However, the last two weeks have changed things as we’ve watched his ability to strongly lead our nation in the most critical times appear to crumble completely under pressure.
So to witness yet another incident of apparent disorientation and forgetfulness on the part of the commander-in-chief who oversaw the disgraceful and deadly withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, leaving a wicked regime well-equipped with a treasure trove of our equipment that it’s now apparently using to hang people — it’s too much.
This has gone too far.
I did not sit through four years of spurious questions as to then-President Donald Trump’s mental fitness for office just to stand by quietly while his successor routinely displays potential symptoms of dementia and those same amateur diagnosticians sit contentedly by.
I might even concede that Trump was entirely off his rocker while in office if only we’d all speak plainly about what’s going on with Joe.
At the start of a televised virtual meeting with key leaders involved in Hurricane Ida response and relief on Monday morning, the 78-year-old president found himself terribly tongue-tied when he was faced with the arduous task of remembering the name of his FEMA director, Deanne Criswell.
“I’m here, uh, uh, eh, the F-FEMA director’s on, uh, uh, FEMA Director Criswell, sh-she’s on. And I’m here with, uh, with my s-senior adviser and, uh — boy who knows Louisiana very, very well, man, and, and New Orleans, and uh, Cedric Richmond,” Biden stammered.
Full disclosure: I am not a medical professional, and if I were, I still would not be able to make a diagnosis for a patient I had not personally examined, so I cannot attest to whether this is dementia. But we must admit this behavior is certainly consistent with a long train of incidents suggesting, at the very least, the president is displaying signs of cognitive decline.
In the clip, Biden is clearly either struggling to remember Criswell’s name or just plain struggling to talk.
Either way, it’s glaringly conspicuous. You see, the president didforget Criswell’s namejust last week when addressing the nation on Afghanistan and the then-incoming storm, and he only seemed to have been slightly more prepared to recall it this time around.
In one of the most painful examples, Biden flat-out blanked on what the Pentagon was called, what the secretary of defense was called and the name of the person he had appointed to the job entirely in one go while giving remarks early on in his presidency.
Whoops: Biden forgets the name of the Pentagon, as well as the name of his secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin pic.twitter.com/ZtcgHLBIAO
Consider that this is the man who was calling the shots over the last two horrific weeks amid our precarious and chaotic withdrawal from the 20-year Afghan war — someone who might not even be able to keep his Cabinet officials or military leaders straight.
All this raises the question — who on earth is running our country?
Atlantic magazine, owned by billionaire widow of Steve Jobs, Laurene Powell Jobs, published an essay Monday congratulating President Joe Biden for the Afghan evacuation that has thus far left 13 U.S. service members dead and numerous amounts of military gear in the hands of the Taliban terrorists.
“If anything, Americans should feel proud of what the U.S. government and military have accomplished in these past two weeks,” Jobs’ publication claimed. “President Biden deserves credit, not blame.”
Jobs’ magazine praised the deadly evacuation as “one of the most extraordinary logistical feats in their recent history” by pointing to the number of extractions Biden failed to conduct months before the Taliban-enforced deadline of August 31.
“By the time the last American plane lifts off from Hamid Karzai International Airport on August 31, the total number of Americans and Afghan allies extricated from the country may exceed 120,000,” the essay said, referencing the 13 dead U.S. service members that “didn’t deter the military.”
Upon acknowledging the deaths of U.S. service members, the article gave Biden credit for the military’s heroic actions by suggesting Biden was steadfast in his decision making, “And he did so even as his critics again sought to capitalize on tragedy for their own political gain.”
Jobs’ magazine continued to explain why “Americans should feel proud” about Biden’s deadly Afghan evacuation:
The Biden administration nimbly adapted its plans, ramping up the airlift and sending additional troops into the country to aid crisis teams and to enhance security. Around-the-clock flights came into and went out of Afghanistan. Giant cargo planes departed, a number of them packed with as many as 600 occupants.
The State Department tracked down Americans in the country, as well as Afghans who had worked with the U.S., to arrange their passage to the airport. The Special Immigrant Visa program that the Trump administration had slowed down was kicked into high gear.
Despite years of fighting, the administration and the military spoke with the Taliban many times to coordinate passage of those seeking to depart to the airport, to mitigate risks as best as possible, to discuss their shared interest in meeting the August 31 deadline.
The article failed to mention that Biden’s military strategy of negotiating with the Taliban terrorists included giving the group lists of evacuees who were stranded outside the airport while delegating the outer security of the airport to the Taliban even after suicide bombers killed scores of Afghans and Americans.
Breitbart News’ Editor-in-Chief Alex Marlow in May compared Laurene Powell Jobs to the “well-known persona” of George Soros for her clandestine funding many leftist causes, such as the Emerson Collective (EC), “a hybrid philanthropic and investing limited liability company,” according to Forbes.
“That’s a pretty murky description, which appears to allow them to engage in business and charity without ever being terribly explicit about which is which,” Marlow writes. “I’m not sure which of the two categories it falls under, but EC also happens to own the Atlantic.” Marlow further examines Jobs’ growing influential power in his book, Breaking the News: Exposing the Establishment Media’s Hidden Deals and Secret Corruptions.
Jobs’ far-left politics seems to also shape with whom she does business. In perhaps a not so causal connection, former President Barack Obama’s Secretary of Education Arne Duncan is a board member of EC.
Breitbart News reported Sunday that “Duncan compared people who exercise their freedom to make health decisions regarding the Chinese coronavirus to the Kabul airport suicide bombers who slaughtered more than 100 people.”
Duncan, Jobs’ board member, tweeted, “Have you noticed how strikingly similar both the mindsets and actions are between the suicide bombers at Kabul’s airport, and the anti-mask and anti-vax people here?”
“They both blow themselves up, inflict harm on those around them, and are convinced they are fighting for freedom,” Duncan compared anti-vaxxers to terrorists in a tweet since deleted.
The analogy comes as reports on Monday indicate Biden’s airstrikes in Kabul over the weekend killed at least ten people, including children. “A U.S. drone strike targeting the Islamic State killed 10 civilians in Kabul, including several small children,” family members told the Washington Post.
Shortly after the airstrike, Biden released a statement to justify the killings.
“I said we would go after the group responsible for the attack on our troops and innocent civilians in Kabul, and we have,” Biden said.
South Korea’s National Assembly approved legislation on Tuesday that bans app store operators such as Google and Apple from forcing developers to use their in-app payment systems.
South Korea is reportedly the first country in the world to pass such a bill, which becomes law when it is signed by the president, whose party has backed the legislation.
The tech giants have faced widespread criticism over their practice of requiring app developers to use in-app purchasing systems, for which the companies receive commissions of up to 30%. They say the commissions help pay for the cost of maintaining the app markets.
The legislation prohibits the app market operators from using their monopolies to require such payment systems, which means they must allow alternative ways to pay. It says the ban is aimed at promoting fairer competition.
The bill aims to prevent any retaliation against developers by banning the companies from imposing any unreasonable delay in approving apps.
The legislation also allows South Korean authorities to investigate the operations of app markets to uncover disputes and prevent actions that undermine fair competition.
Regulators in Europe, China and some other markets worry about the dominance of Apple, Google and other industry leaders in payments, online advertising and other fields. Chinese regulators have fined some companies for antimonopoly violations, while other governments are wrestling with how best to keep markets competitive.
The Korea Internet Corporations Association, an industry lobby group that includes South Korea’s largest internet companies including search and online shopping giant Naver, welcomed the passage of the bill, which it said would create healthier competition and give users a wider variety of content at cheaper prices.
Google said it is considering how to comply with the legislation.
“Google Play provides far more than payment processing, and our service fee helps keep Android free, giving developers the tools and global platform to access billions of consumers around the world,” it said in a statement.
“And just as it costs developers money to build an app, it costs us money to build and maintain an operating system and app store. We’ll reflect on how to comply with this law while maintaining a model that supports a high-quality operating system and app store, and we will share more in the coming weeks,” it said.
In the U.S., Apple last week announced that it had agreed to let developers of iPhone apps send emails to users about cheaper ways to pay for digital subscriptions and media.
The concession was part of a preliminary settlement of a lawsuit filed on behalf of iPhone app developers in the U.S. It also addresses an issue raised by a federal court judge who is expected to rule soon on a separate case brought by Epic Games, maker of the popular video game Fortnite.
The judge wondered why Apple couldn’t allow developers of apps like Fortnite to display a range of payment options within their apps.
Apple didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday about the South Korean legislation.
Over the past year, both Google and Apple reduced their in-app commissions from 30% to 15% for developers with less than $1 million in annual revenue – a move covering most of the apps in their respective stores. But the lower commissions don’t help the largest app makers like Epic and Spotify, which have taken their complaints around the world.
The European Union’s executive Commission has accused Apple of distorting competition by forcing developers to use its payment system as well as forbidding them from letting users know about cheaper ways to pay for subscriptions that don’t involve going through an app.
Dozens of U.S. states filed a lawsuit in July taking aim at Google’s store. Australian regulators, meanwhile, have also said they’re concerned about restrictions on in-app purchases that mean developers “have no choice” but to use Apple and Google’s own payment systems, according to an interim report into the dominance issued in April.
More than 11% of households in the United States are home-schooling rather than sending students to public or private institutions, according to census data.
The number of home-schooled students in the U.S. has nearly doubled during the pandemic, as some parents have lost faith in traditional schools while others have opted out due to concerns over COVID-19 .
Around 2.6 million students have switched from traditional school to home-schooling since the pandemic began, according to a new report from Bellwether Education Partners, commissioned by the Walton Family Foundation.
“Over the past 18 months, the parents of an estimated 11.3 million students, or nearly one in five of the nation’s schoolchildren, did not get what they wanted from their child’s school,” the Bellwether report said. The total number of students being home-schooled in the U.S. now stands at approximately 5 million.
Census data shows that home-schooling families grew at a rapid rate from 1999 to 2012 before plateauing at around 3.3% of the entire U.S. population. Recent events, including the pandemic, caused a massive spike in families looking for alternatives to traditional learning.
The data also showed that more diverse demographics have opted to turn away from traditional learning. Approximately 9.7% of white families have retreated to home-schooling, along with 12.1% of Hispanic families, 8.8% of Asian families, and 16.1% of black families, according to the report.
School systems throughout the U.S. have reported increased rates of failure due to virtual learning. In Fairfax County, Virginia, a November report from the Office of Research and Strategic Improvement found that the percentage of failing grades was up more than 80% compared to last year’s rates — jumping from 6% to 11%.
A July report citing data from Baltimore public high school students found that at least 41% of students earned a below-D grade point average, a shift that took place after schools shuttered for online learning.
Romy Drucker, the K-12 education director at the Walton Family Foundation, claimed the U.S. education system has been slow to innovate and the pandemic exposed some of its flaws to parents who were on the fence about adjusting their children’s education plan.
“Parents want greater personalization, and this seems like a trend that’s here to stay,” Drucker said. “Schools will have to earn back the trust of parents.”
COVID-19 vaccines’ ability to keep people out of the hospital is waning, albeit slightly, said the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Monday during an advisory panel meeting.
The agency has estimated that most people being treated for the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus are unvaccinated, saying that about 97 percent haven’t received the shot, although it’s not clear whether those unvaccinated individuals in the hospital previously had COVID-19 or not.
The CDC panel on Monday noted that the 97 percent figure was based on data that was collected before the spread of the Delta variant. Now, the latest CDC analysis estimates that vaccines’ effectiveness at keeping people out of the hospital is between 75 percent and 95 percent.
For individuals older than the age of 75, the CDC panel said, vaccine effectiveness against hospitalization saw the largest decline. The effectiveness went from 90 percent in June to 80 percent in July, said the agency, noting that a person’s immunity could be weakening over time, namely among older people, the most vulnerable group.
Officials during the panel’s briefing, however, said that COVID-19 vaccines are still effective at preventing serious illness.
The CDC and Food and Drug Administration last week said they would push for people to get booster shots, or third doses of the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines, by Sept. 20, triggering criticism from the World Health Organization and other groups who said the priority should be placed on providing poorer nations with vaccines.
Earlier this month, officials in Israel, a country that has one of the world’s highest vaccination rates, issued a warning saying that of the country’s 650 new daily COVID-19 cases, more than half were among the fully vaccinated.
“This is a very clear warning sign for the rest of world,” Ran Balicer, chief innovation officer at Clalit Health Services, told news outlets in mid-August. “If it can happen here, it can probably happen everywhere.” Officials in Israel are now offering a booster shot to all vaccinated people.
A new study, also from Israel, found that individuals who already contracted COVID-19 and gained a natural immunity were shown to have much greater protection against the Delta variant. Individuals who tested positive for the virus were less likely to become infected, sick, or in need of hospital treatment, compared with people who received two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA vaccine, the shot predominantly used in Israel. The preprint study has yet to be peer-reviewed.
The Epoch Times has contacted Pfizer and Moderna for comment.
As a former citizen of a communist country, the bishop is very much opposed to the ‘sanitary dictatorship’ that is being set up in so many countries under the pretense of fighting COVID-19.
Bishop Athanasius Schneider is certainly the most outspoken bishop on the subject of abortion-tainted vaccines, but as a former citizen of a communist country – having lived as a child in a member state of the Soviet Union – he is also very much opposed to the “sanitary dictatorship” that is being set up in so many countries under the pretense of fighting COVID-19. As France is sliding into an increasingly totalitarian system where COVID “vaccination” will be compulsory as of September 15, and where both the public and employees are being forced to exhibit a “sanitary pass” for many ordinary acts of life, Bishop Schneider answered LifeSite’s questions about the eschatological dimension of these unprecedented requirements.
“I do not say this is the direct sign of Beast, to be clear, but it could be already in part a prefiguration of this sign,” he answered, repeating several times that the measures being imposed are in a way making the state the “owner” of your body.
“If the government has absolute power to force you, and to say how your body should be, then you have lost you last privacy because your body belongs to you,” he said.
Bishop Schneider made very clear that we are under a double obligation to resist these developments: conscientious objection against the use of abortion-tainted vaccines must go together with practical resistance, for instance by creating networks that allow people to buy and sell, and also travel, without needing to obtain a sanitary pass.
“We have already now to seek all the practical possibilities to avoid this new forced dictatorship over our body and our freedom. If we do not do this, there will be a totalitarianism that will be complete, and this will be the end of every human society,” he said, more than once using the word “slavery” to describe the consequences of the measures being forced on French citizens.
But Bishop Schneider’s message is anything but pessimistic. Seen from the point of view of eternity, the present situation will be “to the benefit of the good of souls,” he underscored, recalling that all that God permits ultimately contributes to His greater glory.
Nor does Bishop Schneider believe that transhumanism will be allowed to prosper up to the point where a new kind of man would be created by the powers of science: “God will not permit it.”
Finally, he encouraged all the faithful to place themselves under the protection of the Virgin Mary, who has all powers of intercession on our behalf.
Here below is the full transcript of Bishop Schneider’s recorded video interview with LifeSite.
LifeSiteNews: The French government has introduced mandatory vaccination for the health professions and all those who work with sick people or the elderly. This ranges from firemen to home care assistants. There is a very strong mobilization against this “vaccine” mandate. For other people, the government has set up a sanitary pass; unvaccinated people can get one that is only valid for 72 hours after testing negative for COVID-19. This is in fact designed to prevent them from living a normal life, since without this test, which would have to be repeated every three days, they cannot access large shopping centres, cafés, restaurants, a large number of hotels, concerts, cinemas, etc. Fortunately, churches are excluded from this scheme, but visiting a person who is in hospital is prohibited, as is access to hospital for non-urgent care. With this QR code requirement, the unvaccinated person is effectively made an outcast, threatened with very heavy fines for any breach of the law. What do you think of this type of scheme?
Bishop Athanasius Schneider: I think this goes fundamentally against human rights and human dignity because, as you mentioned, two classes of people will be established in society, and those who are not vaccinated are in fact becoming a kind of person who has almost no equal rights compared with the others. This means they become a kind of slave because they have no rights: substantially, they have no freedom. I consider this to be very dangerous – this establishing of a two-class society. As I said, this is fundamentally contrary to human rights and human dignity: we are returning to societies of totalitarianism. We have known totalitarian systems where a special kind of people for various reasons, or for racial reasons, were marked by an exterior sign, and did not have the same civil rights as the others.
So this is a really dangerous phenomenon. We are now approaching it under the pretext, of course, of sanitary measures and health care. This is only a pretext because there is no certain proof that the vaccination is really effective to prevent COVID contamination. There are even proven cases – this is not some conspiracy theory – of people whose names are known, who got the virus even after receiving COVID vaccination; they were tested positive and in some cases, people’s health conditions even got worse. Because we have those cases already, it should be a sign that this vaccination cannot be an absolute demand; therefore, we have to protest against these evident violations of fundamental rights and even against these violations of evidence which exist. When our society is turning into a place where evidence is simply denied, this is a sign that we are in a dictatorship because only a dictatorial political system denies evident facts in order to promote its program. It is clear that there is a program to vaccinate all the people in order to achieve a concrete political, social, or ideological objective.
LSN: The Spanish Constitutional Court has recently decided that a theoretical vaccine, even in the case of a major epidemic, cannot be considered constitutional.
Bp. Schn.: That at least is good news: that no one can be forced by a government to be vaccinated. A similar decision was made by the European Council. This is already a good sign because if the government has absolute power to force you, and to say how your body should be, then you have lost your last privacy because your body belongs to you. With this forced vaccination, the government is, not in theory but de facto, declaring that it is the government that will become the owner of your body. For me, this is the ultimate expression of extreme communism because communism aims to say that all belongs to the state, such as the means of production and so on – education, family, all is common. But now even the body, your own body, is becoming the property of the state.
The communists were already beginning to [confiscate] parents’ own children, in order to take them to education camps, when parents did not obey state ideology. These parents were deprived of their children! Now some Western European countries are doing the same, taking away children from the family when they oppose gender ideology education in schools. Now we are witnessing something similar with de facto forced vaccination. When you have to have these green passes by being tested every third day; this is a practical, very cunning, and cynical violation aimed at forcing people to receive vaccination. I ask myself: now that the European Council and the Spanish court have issued that decision saying that the state does not have the right to force someone to be vaccinated, will the governments apply these decisions? Who will have the power to give us the guarantee that these decisions will be applied? But at least it is a beginning and a good step.
LSN: In France there are already 11 mandatory vaccinations for children under 2 years old including the Rubella vaccine which is often abortion-tainted. However, these are not associated with a pass or a QR code. Do you think that with the imposition of a QR code we are entering into something different?
Bp. Schn.: Of course, because you are completely controlled. You have no more freedom, even regarding the privacy of your body. Information about your body is in this code so, yes, it’s a substantial difference, and therefore we have to protest against this code that will affect the privacy of the body.
LSN: You have spoken out strongly against the use of fetal cells obtained through abortion for the development, production, and testing of COVID vaccines. As we all know, many experts in moral theology have explained that for the individual who would use these vaccines, this would be a mere remote cooperation with evil, and that, in view of the issues at stake, we can accept this injection. You have already addressed these questions in substance many times; you have explained your thoughts and opinions. I would like to ask you today if you do not think that these leaders are depriving Catholics of the support of the Church with regard to their right – not to say their duty – of conscientious objection, which can even extend to refusal?
Bp. Schn.: This is evident because … the church authority says okay, you can take this vaccination because there is a moral theory which says this is a remote material cooperation. They tranquillize and calm consciences with this; by this they are substantially weakening any resistance which we must oppose.
We have to resist and protest against the horrible phenomenon in our society which is the so-called “fetal industry.” We must distinguish between two different industries that are of course intimately connected: the abortion industry itself which is horrible, and the other: the so-called fetal industry, the use of tissues of aborted babies and the marketing of the body parts of the aborted babies. Here they are being used for research or for the production of several medicines including vaccines. So the vaccines which were produced by using these cell lines, or tested on them, are a de facto part of the so-called fetal industry. This fetal industry needs to be distinguished from the abortion industry even if they are connected; but the fetal industry is closer to us, so when you are using the product, the vaccine is a direct product of the fetal industry. So we are no longer remote to this fetal industry, and it is a very grave immorality to participate with full knowledge and full freedom in this horrible phenomenon of our society. For a Catholic, the fetal industry is immoral and very grave because we are de facto collaborating with it, and especially committing a great sin of omission, in failing to protest clearly and strongly, at least against the use of cell lines in the fetal industry and in vaccination.
Therefore, it is a great irresponsibility of the Church, even of the Vatican and of theologians who tranquilize and calm the conscience of the people, and who in this way are paralyzing the resistance. This is serious.
I have to add another phenomenon. I recently spoke with a woman who has converted deeply to God. In her past life, she committed abortions, and after converting to God she recognized all the horrors of abortion. I spoke with her about abortion-tainted vaccinations, and she said to me that she could better understand this horrible situation of abortion-tainted products and medicines than I, or than any woman who has never experienced an abortion. She told me: “I can say that all that is connected to abortion in medicines and in their production is so horrible for me because I was so deeply wounded by the fact of abortion.” She told me she can never accept any medicine or product or vaccination which is linked in some way to the … assassination of a child.
LSN: I meet many people now who, for various reasons, are absolutely opposed to the vaccine, but who risk losing their jobs, their families’ livelihoods, if they do not take it. They say: my duties of state are to ensure the survival of my family, and I cannot do otherwise than to receive this vaccine, even if I am totally opposed to it. Added to this is the fact that many medicines and other vaccines that everyone in France has received are already affected by this. What would you tell them?
Bp. Schn.: For other vaccines and medicines that are contaminated with abortion, we have to have the proof: the pharmaceutical companies have to give the proof that this medicine was tainted or tested. As to the currently famous anti-COVID vaccines such as Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, [and] Sputnik, the pharmaceutical industry has acknowledged this. For other medicines we have as yet no public acknowledgment, so we can use them because we have no proofs. But we should ask this about every medicine. From the moment I receive from the pharmaceutical company the proof that a medicine is tainted with abortion, I have the obligation not to use it and to use another medicine. We must choose good companies and doctors who can provide us with an alternative medicine that is not tainted with abortion, or at least a natural medicine that God gave us – and maybe this will be more helpful for us.
The second point is more difficult, involving people who know they will lose their job – especially parents who have to provide for their families. This is, of course, a very difficult question. But at least they should do all that is possible to avoid receiving such a vaccine. They can make a conscientious objection; perhaps they can even obtain a document from their doctor who will say that for a medical reason this person cannot receive a vaccination – because there is some allergy, for example. In such a case, they have to try to find all the possible means to avoid this, or even change jobs, even if this will leave them poorer. They have to choose this and not a vaccine because of this close support of the fetal industry – not of the abortionists but of the fetal industry.
I think that God will reward these people with many spiritual gifts if they choose to live a poorer life rather than to co-operate with the fetal industry. Surely they will not die from starvation, God will never permit it! This was our experience in communist times. My parents did not collaborate with the Communist Party, for example; therefore, my parents could not have a profession, this was not allowed. And so they were simple workers, they had a low salary, and we lived in a really simple way. But God did not abandon us; we were happy in our faith and this gave us riches for all our life – even when the others who had accepted the conditions of the Communist Party had better living conditions than we did, and than other people, Christians, for example. And so I think we have to give again the primacy to the eternal life which we have so largely forgotten in recent decades. Even in the Church, even the good Catholics, we were invaded by a kind of materialism because we were so very attached to the material life and giving it primacy over the eternal and the spiritual.
So this is a principle: I would say change work, and even if I have to do a simple job like cleaning the streets, I will still have some means to sustain my family, but in a poorer way. This is a decision of conscience, I think, but God will reward these people, of course, and it will be a sign of protest, and a witness that we are not collaborating with the horrible fetal industry.
LSN: What is your response to those who say that such measures, the sanitary pass, for example, and widespread vaccination, are absolutely essential so that we all together can recover public liberties, and that to refuse them is to show selfishness? We are hearing this a lot: people who don’t want the vaccine are being called egoists.
Bp. Schn.: No, this is not egoism. If you get the vaccine, you will only find apparent freedom because this so-called sanitary pass is transforming you into a slave, because with this pass your body will belong to the state and no longer to you, in some way, with these codes and so on, and that is how you are losing your freedom. How can you call it egoism when it is not proven that the vaccine protects from contamination of the virus? It’s not proven that when you have received the vaccine that you cannot develop or transmit COVID. We conserve more freedom when we do not receive it.
LSN: Is this QR code an attempt to impose the mark of the beast of which the Apocalypse speaks, or a sort of prefiguration of it, insofar as the non-vaccinated risk finding themselves the victims of a kind of confinement, which for many will make it impossible to earn a living or to pursue their studies?
Bp. Schn.: We can say that this is perhaps already a kind of prefiguration of the mark of the Beast. Maybe I would not say myself, directly, that this is already the mark of the Beast. I have not yet all the elements to say this, but at least we can say it is a kind of prefiguration because the Apocalypse says you cannot buy or sell if you have not the mark in your hand, on your body. It is very close when people who are not marked in their body with the vaccine – this is a mark – cannot enter certain shops or supermarkets: they cannot enter, they cannot buy or sell there, and this is literally already being carried out.
I think we have to be prepared to be excluded. Perhaps alternative systems can be established: for example, those who are against vaccination can perhaps make a new chain of exchange, the private exchange of products in a smaller manner, with small shops that are not submitted to the pass, or in the open air, or private chains of exchange of produce. I think it is possible to establish this. In France there are large protests against forced vaccination: I think these protests could lead to new mutual systems of buying and selling products that people need because so many people are involved. Hopefully in other places and in other countries such systems of selling products can be created.
We have to find alternatives; it is very important even for the buying and selling of products. When we are excluded from public transport, like trains, buses, and so on, we can create a system to travel with private cars. We must already seek all the practical possibilities to avoid this new forced dictatorship over our body and our freedom. If we do not do this, there will be a totalitarianism that will be complete, and this will be the end of every human society.
I appeal even to nonbelievers, all people of good will: please already start to plan alternative systems, in transportation, in buying and selling products, maybe for studying also, by having private study centers. We have to develop these at least theoretically and then practically, with all these good people who are demonstrating: how to survive. We have to make a world alliance of protest and alternatives; if we do not, we will have a complete totalitarian system. And this we have to avoid.
LSN: Can the QR code used to prove vaccine status already be in itself considered as a form of the mark of the Beast?
Bp. Schn.: Yes. This code will contain all your private information about your health that is already under control of the state. This code is linked, as I understand it, to the vaccine. The vaccination contains at least some “footprints” of abortion, even if they are very far from the horrible assassination of children which is already in itself a satanic act. The using of their bodies, of their tissues, is also in se satanic because it is a revolt against God, the Giver of life. In this case the abortion-tainted vaccines have some satanic footprints, even though they be remote, of the Beast. So the vaccine, with its corresponding code number, is a prefiguration of the sign of the Beast. I do not say this is the direct sign of Beast, to be clear, but it could be already in part a prefiguration of this sign and therefore we have to avoid this also. This code is immoral in some way as, I repeat, the government is completely taking possession of your body.
LSN: In your opinion, is it in theory permissible to find ways of circumventing the law in order to escape its harshness, for example, by means of a false certificate? I would not encourage people to do so because of the heavy fines involved.
Bp. Schn.: The de facto compulsory vaccine is an abuse of power on the part of the government; that is in itself immoral. By it, I repeat, the government is becoming the owner of your body and your privacy, and this is against fundamental rights. God ordered the structure of society which government has not the power to do. The intrinsically evil law of forced vaccination which is in some way connected or tainted with abortion and the fetal industry is immoral. Because it is a forced act, I think you can in this way present even a fake document.
I would compare this situation with the immoral laws when some totalitarian governments issued immoral orders against the Jews. We know that Pope Pius XII and the bishops, when the Jews were persecuted by the Nazis, permitted the use of fake documents to protect the Jews. It was allowed because the laws against the Jews were intrinsically immoral.
It would be a kind of self-defense: you defend yourself your body and your privacy from an aggressor who is [oppressing] you. In the same way you can defend your child or your family against an aggressor who would kill your children or take them into slavery. For example, when you are a mother and you have children in your house and evil people arrive who want to steal your children to put them into slavery: if they ask you if your children are there, surely as a mother you will say “no,” because you have to protect them. Telling them: “Yes, they are here, I will open the door and show you where they are” would be crazy if you were a mother. You say, “No, they are not here.” You will say an untruth, but because it is intrinsically evil to take your children into slavery. When there are no other ways, it is the last means of self-protection against the aggression of the state.
LSN: What would be the precise responsibility of an elected politician who votes for such measures? In France they obtained a positive vote of the Assembly and the Senate; each time, a large proportion of the parliamentarians were missing, they were absent. The law was adopted with very few voters. In your opinion, what is the responsibility of these elected officials who voted for these laws or who were not there to vote against them; or the responsibility of the policeman or the gendarme who is in charge of the implementation of these laws?
Bp. Schn.: The members of parliament have full responsibility, I think, because they are representing and are elected for the common good of the citizens. When they abstain or vote in favor of these dictatorial, totalitarian laws to control you completely, to disown you or your own body with this compulsory vaccination, they are committing evil because they are collaborating in making you slaves of the state, in making your body become a property of the state. It’s immoral to collaborate in making such laws, and also to abstain. As for the policeman who implements this, he has a lesser responsibility because he is only fulfilling the orders of the state. Maybe he is not even personally convinced, but he will be forced, so it is not so much his own responsibility as the fact that he is executing an unjust law. In some cases I think the police, as responsible citizens, can find some way to protect you, maybe not to be severe, for example, in checks and so on while formally obeying the law. In all dictatorships, even in Nazi camps, there are policemen who find a way to protect the people.
LSN: What is your spiritual advice for Catholics who are worried? I see many who are very afraid now of the situation that is arising. What would you tell them to do?
Bp. Schn.: First, I would give them the word of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Gospel. He says, Do not fear those who kill your body, but fear those who will take your soul, or damage your soul. We must not fear the government; we have to give the primacy to our soul, to our spiritual life, to the life of prayer with the sacraments, and thus we should be deeply rooted in our prayer every day. We must be rooted in our faith, in our conviction that our life is ultimately in the hands of God and not in the hands of the government, even in a dictatorship, even in a totalitarian system! Our life is ultimately in the hands of God who is our heavenly Father. He is our Father even when we are, in certain periods of time, in distress and persecuted and humiliated as with this forced vaccination. This is a relatively short time, so we have to look wider and further because God permits this ultimately only for the benefit of our soul. Saint Paul says all will contribute to the greater benefit of those who love God, all things will contribute to the benefit of a greater good for those who love God. If we are rooted in our faith, in the trust of the Providence of our heavenly Father, knowing that our life is in His hands, this should give us confidence. We know the current sanitary COVID dictatorship, this totalitarianism is short, it is relatively short, it is not eternity! History has always shown that dictatorships did not last so long, and God will even show to these new “sanitary dictators” that their power is limited. We have to believe that God will intervene in history.
We must also concentrate deeply on the fact that maybe this is an appeal of God for us to go deeper in our prayer lives. We have to deepen our sacramental life with more regular confession, more regular Communion, and prayers. Maybe we should be more united with all those who are opposing this dictatorship, to make a chain. Maybe these difficult times are an opportunity to confess God, to be faithful to Him. But God is so good that He always gives the necessary graces, and He rewards us in difficult times and gives us His consolations. This is my counsel and my advice.
LSN: It appears to us that there is a will to take over the human body, a transhumanist plan that is being put in place, and even carried out. Is it conceivable that God would allow mankind to fall – for most people unwillingly – into something so contrary to His will for mankind?
Bp. Schn.: I think not because God reserves to Himself His divine powers of creation, and so there will not be a substantially new human being as transhumanists want to create. They will not succeed: God will not permit it. He is the Lord; we have to believe this. They will perhaps produce some things, but it will not be a human being, never, because God creates the soul which is the essential part of the human being. I repeat: I do not believe that God will permit this. His are the powers of the Creator, and they are reserved to Him. If they continue with these horrible things that blaspheme God, there will come the end of times as we read in the Apocalypse and the Judgment. And for us Jesus said: When this time comes, lift up your head because your salvation is close, lift up your head in confidence, your salvation is close! Once again, we must take this situation as an opportunity to deepen our faith, our prayer, and to be more rooted in the vision of eternal life, to be more supernaturally orientated to our eternal life because we are living here in the valley of tears, as we sing in the Salve Regina: hac lacrimarum valle. This is our situation, but there is also the deep joy that we have a Mother. She never abandons us, and she is always close to us. This is my advice, that never will she abandon us, she is the intercessional omnipotens, the omnipotens of intercession for us. She will take care of us; always, we have to flee under her mantle. Especially in these times, we must pray: Sub tuum praesidium confugimus, Sancta Dei Genitrix: we will flee under her protection.
Mercury Radio Arts CEO and Christian commentator Glenn Beck has reportedly raised more than $30 million for Afghanistan and used it as funding to evacuate 5,100 Christians and at-risk Afghans.
The Christian Today said Beck sponsored the evacuation carried out by his U.S. non-profit Nazarene Fund, who airlifted evacuees which included U.S. nationals and women. The Nazarene Fund, an organization aiding persecuted Christians, ceased the evacuation flights when the United States government started withdrawing military personnel after the two explosions Thursday.
On the morning of August 26, two suicide bombers suspected to be members of ISIS-K, the Afghanistan branch of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, detonated themselves one after the other near the Hamad Karzai International Airport’s Abbey Gate causing many injured including 15 U.S. troops while leaving 13 U.S. service men and 60 Afghans dead.
Two days later three ISIS-K members, on their way to setting off another bomb near the airport, were intercepted by an unmanned U.S. drone airstrike.
Beck said the refugees are safely awaiting settlement in an undisclosed country. He said those left behind will not be forgotten and expressed concerned for them being Christians.
He pointed in a post in Facebook that, although those left behind are not American citizens, they have become accustomed to the freedom they have enjoyed for two decades in “being able to say I’m a Christian” due to the “protection the United States government offered.” He stressed that the U.S. promised them that freedom but are now “leaving them.”
“We will not forget those left behind. Our mission there gets tougher and more dangerous. We also still have more work to do as now we have 5,100 refugees sitting in another country wondering who will claim them? Sadly, but certainly not America,” Beck said.
“May God bless the refugees and new home countries and may He heal their land. These refugees are good and faithful servants that make me embarrassed to call myself Christian,” he added.
Beck, a conservative commentator, launched last August 18 a “monumental goal of raising $20 million in 48 hours” for the Nazarene Fund to rescue religious minorities from Afghanistan. Less than week later, Beck was able to raise over $28 million and evacuate over a thousand Christians through his rescue mission.
“Operation Nazarene Rescue: flight three has just taken off. Now 1200 Christians evacuated and flown to safety. It has been a good day! Thank you for the outpouring of prayers and support! Because of The Power Of One people will LIVE. Wow! Thank you for donating to @mercuryone.org and @thenazarenefund,” Beck announced in Facebook on August 24.
“America does care! America does not leave her own and the most vulnerable behind. WE CAN DO IT AS THE POWER IS WITH THE PEOPLE. We are America not our government. When they can’t do it, private citizens step to the plate,” he added.
Beck disclosed previously that countries the refugees from Afghanistan are intended to be evacuated to were experiencing “cold feet” in accepting them for settlement. Beck asked for prayers on the matter which he described as a “battle of good vs evil.” As per Beck, one of the countries who welcome refugee Christians was Zimbabwe.
Gates Foundation ‘Working With Chinese Gov’t’ to Promote Beijing’s Global Medical Clout: Report
In January 2020, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced that it would donate $10 million to contain the spread of the coronavirus in China and Africa.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation closely cooperated with Beijing to enable the sale of Chinese-produced medications outside China, new emails have revealed.
The documents, recently released from the US-based National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) under Dr Anthony Fauci, were obtained by the American activist group Judicial Watch through a Freedom of Information Act request.
The emails contain a 5 September 2017 report by Ping Chen, an NIAID representative in China, who told her colleagues she attended a Gates Foundation meeting that “initially planned to talk about global malaria eradication efforts”.
She mentioned the Gates Foundation providing funding for China’s National Medical Products Administration, previously known as China’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to appoint experienced Chinese-Americans who had worked at the US FDA to work in the Chinese agency.
Ping also claimed that the Gates Foundation “is working with the Chinese government” to promote Beijing’s medical clout in countries, including those in Africa.
The past few years have seen China expand its clout in Africa, with the US-based think tank Heritage Foundation claiming in a report last year that “Beijing likely has better surveillance access to Africa than anywhere else by having built or renovated at least 186 African government buildings”.
Separately in the email, Ping referred to a meeting with a group from the Global Virome Project (GVP), which aims to tackle “high impact viral epidemics and pandemics” and is partially funded by USAID [United States Agency for International Development].
Ping was apparently referring to WIV Deputy Director Shi Zhengli, a top Chinese virologist, who was dubbed “Bat Woman” by the Chinese media for her consistent work with bat coronaviruses and included in Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People of 2020.
Shortly after the emails were released by NIAID, Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton demanded that the Gates Foundation “explain the government report about its assistance to and advocacy for China”. The organisation has yet to comment on the matter.
China Slams US Intel Report on COVID Origins
The emails come after the Chinese Embassy in Washington, DC, bashed a newly released US intelligence report on the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, claiming that the document does not have scientific credibility and incorrectly suggests that Beijing is hindering a global investigation into the origins of the deadly outbreak.
Beijing has repeatedly rejected Washington’s allegations that COVID-19 originated in a Wuhan lab, warning the White House not to politicise the issue. China also often refers to theories suggesting the coronavirus leaked from the US Army’s Fort Detrick base in Maryland, in 2019, insisting that Washington should invite World Health Organisation (WHO) experts to investigate Fort Detrick.
Late March saw the release of a WHO report that argued it is “extremely unlikely” the coronavirus escaped from a Wuhan bio lab. China recently rejected the WHO’s call “to work together” on the UN body’s second probe into the origins of COVID, insisting that the first probe was sufficient and that Beijing prefers scientific to political efforts to find out how “the worst pandemic in a century” started.