Ahead Of Olympic Opening, Scientists Demand China Stop Obstructing COVID-19 Investigations

JAKARTA - Hours before the opening ceremony of the Beijing Winter Olympics, an international group of scientists demanded that China stop obstructing an independent investigation into the origins of COVID-19.

A total of 20 scientists from Europe, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, India and Japan Thursday published an open letter strongly criticizing Beijing for preventing efforts to truly understand how the pandemic started.

The open letter entitled "Allowing a Comprehensive International Investigation of the Origins of the Pandemic to Be a True Expression of Olympic Value", warned that failure to uncover the exact origins of the virus that causes COVID-19 puts the world at greater risk of future pandemics.

"Continued efforts by the Chinese government to block important investigations into the origins of the pandemic ... have become an insult to the international scientific community and people everywhere," the letter said.

Scientists are urging countries and people around the world to use the Olympics to highlight China's inhibitions and demand it change course.

The "noble aspirations" of the Olympics "are undermined by the continued efforts of the host government to prevent a comprehensive international investigation into the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic," they wrote.

The scientists accused Beijing of "destroying biological samples, hiding records (and) jailing daring Chinese citizen journalists".

They also denounced "a series of gag orders that prevent Chinese scientists from saying or writing anything about the origins of the pandemic without the government's prior approval".