House Committee Asks Blinken to Declassify Documents That “Credibly Suggest” COVID-19 Leaked from Wuhan Lab | Wuhan Institute of Virology | Chinese Communist Party | CCP

Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), chairman of the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, said classified State Department documents “credibly suggest” that COVID-19 originated in a “laboratory-related accident ” in China.

In a May 7 letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Mr. Wenstrup asked the State Department to declassify the records, saying that the full content of the documents would allow the American people “to have a more complete picture of the government’s evidence on the origin of the COVID-19 pandemic”.

The lawmaker noted that the same documents had been released in 2023 in an “unclassified and highly redacted Freedom of Information Act production” for the US Right to Knowa nonprofit public health research group.

The classified documents the committee received from the State Department “contain highly pertinent information that credibly suggests” three conclusions, one of which is that “COVID-19 originated in a laboratory-related accident in Wuhan, China,” according to the letter.

China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) has long been suspected as the source of COVID-19. The institute, which houses a biosafety level 4 (P4) facility, is located a short distance from a local wet market, where clusters of infection cases were reported in late 2019.

The classified documents also suggested that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) “acted to prevent and, in fact, obstructed a full investigation into these matters,” according to the letter.

Mr. Wenstrup said the documents suggested an “ongoing relationship between the WIV and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army.”

“As mounting evidence continues to point to a laboratory-related accident in Wuhan, China, as the likely origin of the COVID-19 pandemic, safely removing these superfluous redactions is a step toward transparency and accountability,” says a press release announcing Mr. Wenstrup’s letter.

Mr. Wenstrup shared two “heavily redacted FOIA versions” of the classified documents.

One of the documents, dated July 2020, shows several subheadings over blurred sections. One headline reads: “The Initial Outbreak Could Have Been Contained in China If Beijing Hadn’t Covered Up,” while another reads: “Who Ordered the Coverup? Signs Point to Beijing, Not Local Officials.”

“Xi Lied to Hide His Role in the Concealment“, says another subtitle, referring to CCP leader Xi Jinping.

The second document, dated August 2020, shows the relationship between the WIV and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Two subheadings read “Cyber ​​Evidence from PLA Shadow Lab at WIV” and “WIV Personnel with Possible Ties to PLA.”

One information leaflet State Department report released in 2021 stated that the WIV had conducted bat coronavirus experiments since at least 2016. The institute has also performed “laboratory animal experiments” for the Chinese military since at least 2017.

“Although the WIV presents itself as a civilian institution, the United States has determined that the WIV collaborated on secret publications and projects with the Chinese military,” the fact sheet says.

“The American people deserve to see the information that is hidden beneath these redactions,” Mr. Wenstrup wrote. “We write to you today to request that you take immediate action to declassify this information.”

Mr. Wenstrup requested a technical-level meeting before May 14 and said he had originally requested a meeting on April 24, but the State Department said it could not support a meeting at that time.

In March 2023, President Joe Biden signed the COVID-19 Origin Lawwhich demands the declassification of intelligence related to the origins of COVID-19.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a declassified report about the origins of COVID-19 in June last year. The report does not conclusively state whether the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes the disease, came from nature or the laboratory.

“All agencies continue to assess that both a natural and laboratory-associated origin remain plausible hypotheses to explain the first human infection,” the 10-page declassified report states.

A peer-reviewed study published in the journal Risk Analysis in March concluded that there was a 68 percent probability of a “non-natural rather than natural origin of SARS-CoV-2”. The study also addressed the hypothesis that the virus came from animals, saying that “no animal has so far been identified as the natural or intermediate host of the virus.”

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