Many governments in the last week have complained that China had secretly purchased massive quantities of medical equipment from Europe and is now re-selling the same to European countries as assistance.
According to China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, it is providing “assistance” to 82 countries, the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the African Union.
Among the countries it has sent supplies to are Italy, France, Greece, Serbia, Spain, Pakistan, Laos, Thailand, Iran, South Korea, Japan, Cambodia, the Philippines, Egypt, South Africa, Iraq, Ethiopia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Cuba and Chile.
TAMING A CRISIS ORIGINATED IN CHINA- Prime Minister Boris Johnson during the Chinese New Year celebrations at No 10 Downing Street
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is also under pressure to name China as a pariah State. Close allies of the prime minister accused the Communist state of cover up and profiteering from the global crisis.
Ministers and senior Downing Street officials said the Communist state now faces a ‘reckoning’ over its handling of the outbreak and risks becoming a ‘pariah state’, the Daily Mail reported. They are furious over China’s campaign of misinformation, attempts to exploit the pandemic for economic gain and atrocious animal rights record.
Another report says that live animal markets are still active in many parts of China despite the official claims. The first coronavirus cases were linked with a market in Wuhan but the outbreak was kept silent by officials for weeks and whistle-blowers were silenced, including 33-yearold Dr Li Wenliang, who later died of coronavirus.
A researcher, Filip Jirous at Sinopsis, a project implemented by AcaMedia, in collaboration with the Department of Sinology at Charles University in Prague, revealed that the Czech authorities confiscated a shipment of medical supplies from a warehouse because a Czech reseller had tried to sell it to the Czech government for an excessive price in the coronavirus pandemic crisis.
During the investigation, the police found that the storage unit belonged to an influential Chinese in Prague, Zhou Lingjian. Jirous said Zhou who co-owns the company CTE CARGO Sped linked to CTE International which sold 580,000 masks to the Czech “shell” company, is in charge of the Czech Qingtian Hometown Association, and runs the most prominent Chinese diaspora media Prague Chinese Times.
“His group has been at the forefront of a collection for Qingtian back in February, buying up 780,000 face masks and 30,000 respirators from Czech drug stores. This created suspicion that the material is actually from the local Chinese collection.”
The researcher tweeted that this incident leaves much doubt about the “aid” that is now coming from China to Europe. Especially since much of what is labelled as “aid” is either sales or directed at the overseas Chinese.
Marion Smith, who runs a think-tank in Washington DC tweeted that the “Czech counter-espionage agency had reported during January and February that Chinese embassy in Prague organised Chinese interests in the country to purchase massive quantities of Czech medical materials which were immediately sent to China.”
“It is now discovered that China’s humanitarian medical supplies to the Czech Republic this month are faulty. 80 per cent of the coronavirus test kits provide false results, mostly false negatives. This deadly aid is a huge element of CCP statecraft right now,” he said.
Not just the Czech Republic, but Turkey has also said that the Chinese test kits are substandard and have a 65 to 70 per cent failure rate. Spain has also complained that 80 per cent of medical supplies from China were faulty.
Profiteering during an outbreak
UK safety equipment firm JSP had its two factories in China ‘requisitioned by the government to make disposable RPE [respiratory protection equipment] for Chinese government agencies’, according to a letter its chief executive Mark Johnstone sent to customers on February 3, the Mail said.
In addition, Chinese state-backed operatives working abroad were directed to bulk-buy medical supplies from Western countries.
Overseas offices of Greenland Group, a property firm backed by the Chinese government, bought three million masks, 700,000 hazmat suits and 500,000 pairs of gloves as it ‘felt compelled… to assist in efforts to mitigate the spread of the virus, which had caused a shortage of crucial medical supplies in China,’ according to a company newsletter seen by the Sydney Morning Herald.
Faulty Kits in Spain
The Chinese embassy in Madrid in a statement said that the Spanish government had bought a batch of faulty COVID-19 testing kits from an unauthorised Chinese company, EFE reported.
Few cars run in a street of Barcelona, Spain. (Photo by Joan Gosa/Xinhua)
Spain’s efforts to roll out 640,000 rapid testing kits bought from companies in China and South Korea last hit a setback when the first order of around 9,000 failed to meet specifications and had to be returned.
The Chinese embassy said the Spanish government had purchased the items from an unlicensed company called Shenzhen Bioeasy Biotechnology.
In a message on Twitter, it said the order had not been part of the €432 million ($466m) contract with China that the Spanish government announced Wednesday (25 March), which would include the delivery of 5.5 million testing kits.
“The Chinese ministry of commerce offered Spain a list of certified providers, which did not include Shenzhen Bioeasy Biotechnology. Shenzhen Bioeasy Biotechnology has not yet been licensed by the Chinese National Medical Products Administration to sell its products,” he said.
The head of Spain’s public health emergency department Fernando Simon confirmed in his daily briefing that the first batch of kits delivered to the country had been sent back to the provider, although he did not name the company in question.
Spain’s Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy (L) stands in front of the Sagrada Familia before a mass to commemorate victims of two devastating terror attacks in Barcelona, Spain (Xinhua/Xu Jinquan) (zhf)
“Spain obtained several providers and supply routes. The first one sent a batch of 9,000 tests that were validated at the National Center of Epidemiology and some hospitals (in Madrid).
However, “the specifications of the batch did not match up with the certification of quality that came with it, which meant they had to be returned and the company will change them,” he said.
The Spanish association of microbiologists (SEIMC) warned that the testing kits in this batch performed with an accuracy level of under 30%,
“With this level of accuracy, it is impossible to put them into routine use,” SEIMC spokeswoman María del Mar Tomás told EFE.