Donald Trump calls WHO a “puppet of China” as WHO conducts virtual meeting

President Donald Trump has once again criticized the World Health Organization by calling it a “puppet of China”.

He termed it after the US said that WHO had led coronavirus “out of control” at the cost of “many lives”.

US Health Secretary Alex Azar said to the UN’s World Health Assembly “There was a failure by this organization to obtain the information that the world needed,”

President Donald Trump has accused China of attempting to cover up coronavirus outbreak and has also blamed WHO for failing to hold China to account.

He said, “I chose not to make a statement today,” He also called WHO “China-centric” and “a puppet of China”.

He said the WHO had “gave us a lot of very bad advice, terrible advice” and were “wrong so much and always on the side of China”.

What happened in WHO’s virtual meeting?

The World Health Organization conducted a virtual meeting on Monday and will continue on Tuesday for the 73rd assembly of the UN body. In this meeting, representatives from 194 of WHO’s member states will meet.

Chinese President Xi Jinping said that China has acted “with openness and transparency” at WHO’s virtual meeting and urged that any investigation should be organized after the pandemic was brought under control.

He said that China would offer $2bn over two years to countries around the world to control the pandemic. He also offered to share the vaccine as soon as they develop it.

White House National Security Council spokesman John Ullyot termed the move as “a token to distract from calls… demanding accountability for the Chinese government’s failure to meet its obligations”.

On the other hand, South Korean President Moon Jae-in said the WHO must be given more legal powers to make sure that countries share information and report outbreaks.

He said, “A novel infectious disease could emerge at any time and we must be able to respond more quickly and effectively,”

European Union and other countries including the UK, Australia, and New Zealand, had been insisting on starting inquiry over how pandemic can be controlled.

EU spokeswoman Virginie Battu-Henriksson said many questions needed to be raised during the review.

“How did this pandemic spread? What is the epidemiology behind it? All this is absolutely crucial for us going forward to avoid another pandemic of this kind,” she said.

However, she added that now was not the time for “any sort of blame game”.

A draft resolution is likely to be made to call for a review.