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Trump blames Chinese ‘incompetence’ for ‘mass Worldwide killing’
WASHINGTON, May 20, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – US President Donald Trump again
lashed out at China Wednesday over the coronavirus pandemic, blaming
Beijing for “mass Worldwide killing.”
The early morning tweet, which also referred to an unidentified
“wacko in China,” was the latest heated rhetoric from the White House,
where Trump is making attacks on Beijing a centerpiece of his November
reelection bid.
“It was the ‘incompetence of China’, and nothing else, that did
this mass Worldwide killing,” the president tweeted.
The virus first appeared in the Chinese city of Wuhan last December
and spread rapidly around the world, killing more than 323,000 people
at the latest count, and triggering huge economic damage.
Trump initially played down the seriousness of the threat and said
repeatedly that China was addressing the outbreak. He later pivoted to
blaming China for allowing the international spread.
The White House has also suggested, without offering evidence so
far, that the virus originated in a laboratory and was accidentally
released. Trump has made repeated but vague threats of retaliation
against the chief US economic rival.
He has also threatened to break off US funding to the World Health
Organization or WHO over what he says was its assistance to China in
covering up the extent of the outbreak.
BSS/AFP/MRU/2039hrs