China’s Covid response well planned, ‘open and transparent’, senior US-based diplomat says
- No delays over foreign vaccine imports other than for commercial reasons and country’s zero-Covid policy reversal well planned, adds Qian Jin
- Beijing seeks to counter foreign countries’ scepticism as US and Japan urge ‘adequate’ data regarding spread of coronavirus
China has not delayed foreign vaccine imports other than for commercial reasons, its zero-Covid policy reversal was well planned and its mortality statistics are accurate and not meant to hide the extent of the problem, a senior Chinese diplomat said on Friday.
“The peak is already possible in Beijing,” said Qian Jin, China’s deputy consul general in New York. “We see the lives coming back to normal, people coming out to the street and the economy is booming.”
Qian added that the rest of China would soon follow and that no new variants were emerging.
“There are some accusations on China’s not being transparent,” he said. “But as a matter of fact, we’ve always been dealing with this question in an open and transparent manner. We shared the genome sequence of the virus at the earliest opportunity.”
Qian, a native of Nanjing, said too often there was a knee-jerk distrust of China’s system, fuelled by a foreign media misinformed about the country’s strong track record of keeping its citizens safe and protected over the past three years.
Beijing has faced criticism globally over a perceived lack of timely and complete reporting on pandemic-related deaths and illness.
