@prashanthamine
Mumbai: The change of administration at the Capitol Hill earlier in January this year has sent a clear signal to the world especially in capitals of India, Australia, Japan and Taiwan. Two days ago, in a blunt admission the 7th Fleet of the US navy admitted to having sent a warship 130 nautical miles of the coast of India’s Lakshadweep islands in clear violation of Indian laws on its territorial waters, continental shelf, Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and Other Maritime Zones Act, 1976.
All this comes just days after India’s Minister for External Affairs, Dr S Jaishankar had participated in the third India-Australia-Japan-USA Quad ministerial meeting held on February 18, 2021. India could do little more than express concern at this serious violation of its territorial sovereignty by the Quad member itself. Is this an indication of the US intent to dismantle the Quad?
The Quad was set-up during the Trump administration with a view to keep China’s growing aggressive flexing of its military muscles in the Indo-Pacific region and the South-China Seas (SCS), especially to lend protective support to Taiwan against belligerent mainland China across the Taiwan Straits.
It is not just the Quad, the coming in of the Biden administration at the Capitol Hill has completely changed the picture at the United Nations Organization (UNO) and its affiliated World Health Organisation (WHO).
The proof of how things have changed at the UN and WHO after the Biden administration has come in is visible from the fact that the United States of America (USA) which had pulled out of the WHO and stopped its funding to the world health body accusing it of turning a blind eye to the outbreak of Coronavirus pandemic in Wuhan, China.
The April 9, 2020 letter of the House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Reforms had squarely blamed WHO and its controversial Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus of helping Beijing disseminate propaganda, downplayed the extent of the disease, and possibly delayed ordering a public health emergency. Throughout the crisis, the WHO shied away from placing any blame on the Chinese government, which is in essence the Communist Party of China, said the April 9, 2020 letter.
A year later, the joint report of the “WHO-convened Global Study of Origins of SARS-CoV-2: China Part, Joint WHO-China Study, 14 January – 10 February, 2021” virtually absolves China of all charges of turning a blind eye towards acts of China and instead goes on to argue that the origins of the Coronavirus might even be outside the international borders of China! The outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic is widely been held to have been first noticed in November-December 2019.
The 120-page report in one of its conclusions states “The Severe Acute Respiratory Illness (SARI) surveillance data from one single provincial hospital in Hubei Province did not suggest any previously undetected clusters of severe respiratory illness compatible with COVID-19 in the months preceding December 2019”.
Also Read: Combined experience of our leaders and bureaucrats isn’t enough to reign in the pandemic?
The joint international team concluded that in terms of “Morbidity surveillance, pharmacy purchases and mass gatherings”, the report further states “the data provided no evidence for substantial SARS-CoV-2 transmission in the months preceding the outbreak in December 20191”.
Furthermore, the WHO report on the role of Huanan Market as original source of the outbreak, states “Transmission within the wider community in December (2019) could account for cases not associated with the Huanan market which together with the presence of early cases not associated with that market, could suggest that the Huanan market was not the original source of the outbreak”. The report further concludes “No firm conclusion therefore about the role of the Huanan Market can be drawn”.
If that is not enough the WHO joint report further concludes in the end that “CoVs (Coronaviruses) that are phylogenetically related SARS-CoV-2 were identified in different animals from different countries, including Bats (Rhinolophus spp) and customs-seized trafficked Malayan pangolins”. It further adds “All the product samples (from Huanan market) retrieved during the outbreak investigation tested negative for SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid.
The report further argues that “Index cases in recent outbreaks in China have been linked to the imported cold-chain”. The report further calls for “further surveys to identify coronaviruses related to SARS-CoV-2 is needed in bats and pangolins in China as well as in Southeast Asia (which is under-sampled), and in Rhinolophus spp. Bats in other countries where this bat genus is found. This should focus in particular on regions where insufficient prior sampling has been done and where analyses show spill-over to people is most likely”.
“Recently, two distinct types of SARSr-CoV were detected in Malayan pangolin (M Javanica sampled in rescue centres in China for smuggled imported wildlife”, contends the WHO report. It further adds “Confirmation of this potential bias is the identification of SARSr-CoVs from pangolin and from bats in Cambodia, Japan and Thailand, in studies that were completed since the start of the pandemic”.
The WHO report rejects the contention that the Covid-19 pandemic broke out from the virology laboratory in Wuhan. The report in its final page concluding remarks on Wuhan lab-leak hypothesis has remarked thus – “Assessment of likelihood – In view of the above, a laboratory origin of the pandemic was considered extremely unlikely”!
In-short the report virtually absolves the Wuhan laboratory of any possible leakage of the Coronavirus. What is important to note here is that prior to this January-February 2021 survey, on July 7, 2020, the alleged breach in the Three Gorges Dam had flooded Wuhan which is just 368 kilometres away from the world’s largest dam. Apprehensions were then expressed about a possible washout of any evidence of the virus.
It is little wonder then that noted strategic thinker Brahma Chellaney was prompted to tweet on April 2 “Beijing thought that after the joint WHO-China study report, the world would move on. But the report, by echoing Chinese propaganda, has only sharpened calls for probing the virus’s real origins, including the lab-leak hypothesis. Even India’s overcautious MEA wants such a probe”.
Judging from the international developments surrounding China and WHO in recent days one thing is abundantly clear the US has changed its stance towards China and is benign to its belligerence towards some of its neighbours. The US warship from its 7th Fleet entering Indian territorial waters unannounced are indications enough that there are no permanent enemies or friends in international geo-politics, and that each one is unto his own.
The changed geo-political scenario is bound to raise concerns for New Delhi during the tenure of the Biden administration in the US. It does make the other Quad members – India, Australia and Japan equally vulnerable to impacts of policy reversals in the US.
