President Donald J. Trump disembarks Marine One Sunday, May 17, 2020, on the South Lawn of the White House, returning from his working weekend at Camp David near Thurmont, Maryland. (Official White House photo by Tia Dufour)
In a pre-recorded speech delivered Tuesday to a virtual United Nations General Assembly, President Trump demanded the global body hold China accountable for the COVID-19 pandemic.
"Seventy-five years after the end of World War II and the founding of the United Nations, we are once again engaged in a great global struggle," Trump said, referring to the battle against the "invisible enemy, the China virus."
"The United Nations must hold China accountable for their actions," he said.
WND reported a top Chinese virologist who has fled Hong Kong fearing for her life contends the Chinese Communist Party manufactured and intentionally released the virus that has led to massive economic shutdowns and more than 970,000 recorded deaths around the world.
Trump accused China of permitting infected people to leave the country during the early stage of the pandemic and lying about it, Politico reported.
The president said the World Health Organization contributed to the disinformation.
Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke shortly after Trump.
He didn't address Trump's comments but stated that no country should "be allowed to do whatever it likes and be the hegemon, bully or boss of the world."
The Guardian's Julian Borger said that comment was "a bit rich given China's military buildup in the South China Sea and its aggressive posture on the border with India, not to mention its mass incarceration of Muslims."
Trump touted the U.S.-brokered deals between Israel and two Arab nations, talks to end the Afghanistan War and an agreement between Serbia and Kosovo.
But he focused on the pandemic.
"In the United States, we launched the most aggressive mobilization, since the Second World War. We rapidly produced a record supply of ventilators creating a surplus that allowed us to share them with friends and partners all around the globe. We pioneered lifesaving treatments, reducing our fatality rate 85 percent since April," Trump said.
"Thanks to our efforts, three vaccines are in the final stage of clinical trials. We are mass producing them in advance so they can be delivered immediately upon arrival," Trump said. "We will distribute a vaccine. We will defeat the virus. We will end the pandemic. And we will enter a new era of unprecedented prosperity, cooperation, and peace."
He said that when the pandemic began, China locked down travel domestically while "allowing flights to leave China – and infect the world."
"The Chinese government and the World Health Organization, which is virtually controlled by China, falsely declared that there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission. Later they falsely said people without symptoms would not spread the disease. The United Nations must hold China accountable for their actions," he said.
The Washington Examiner reported Secretary of State Mike Pompeo confirmed there will be additional U.S. sanctions of China if Beijing allows arms sales to Iran.
"We're going to go after every violation that we can muster the resources to respond to," Pompeo told the Examiner. "That will be [the case], whether it's Chinese violations or violations from the Russians, arms or economic sales; these U.N. Security Council resolutions are serious business."
He mentioned sanctions as the administration returned to the United Nations Security Council to restore earlier sanctions against Iran.
"Having Chinese tanks, or Chinese air defense systems, or defensive missile systems in Iran, in the first instance threatens the people of Iran, in the second instance, threatens the people of the Middle East, and the next people who come under threat are the people who live in Europe,” he told the Examiner. "The real exposure is to European national security from these missile systems, air defense systems."
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