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Donald Trump indicates US might bill China for Covid-19 damages
The president also said the United States is conducting “serious investigations” into China’s failure to stop the coronavirus at the “source” and present it from spreading to the rest of the world.
President Donald Trump on Monday he could bill China for the damages caused by the coronavirus epidemic to the United States and for a “lot more money” than the amount a German news publication has sought for Germany in a mock bill published recently.
The president also said the United States is conducting “serious investigations” into China’s failure to stop the coronavirus at the “source” and present it from spreading to the rest of the world.
Though serious questions are being raised about China’s handling of the outbreak that started in Wuhan in December and has now infected more than 3.06 million people worldwide and killed over 212,000, the American president has been seen escalating attacks on China to deflect criticism of his administration’ failure to respond aggressively to the crisis, stemming mostly from his own reluctance to acknowledge the gravity of the situation.
“Germany is looking at things and we are looking at things,” Trump said Monday in response to a question from a reporter about a mock bill published last week by a German newspaper, Bild, seeking $141 billion (Euros 130 billion) from China for damages caused to Germany by the coronavirus.
“And we are talking about a lot more money than Germany is talking about,” Trump added.
The German government does not appear to have taken the bill seriously and has dismissed it as “illusory”.
But billing China for damages is among the many suggestions emanating from China hawks in the Republican party. Josh Hawley, a Republican senator from Missouri, moved a resolution in March that seeks to hold China “accountable” for the pandemic and “design a mechanism for delivering compensation from the Government of the People’s Republic of China to all affected nations for the harm caused by its decision to hide the emergence and spread of COVID–19 during the initial weeks of the outbreak”.
Missouri, his state, has, in fact, sued China for damages.
Other punitive measures suggested by lawmakers include withholding payment of debt owed to China — as proposed by Senator Lindsey Graham, a close Trump ally and adviser — cut dependence on Chinese supply chains. Several legislation have been moved or are under process.
President Trump did not indicate Monday how he proposed to bill the Chinese for the American epidemic. He only said that the US “can do something much easier than” the German mock bill. “ We have ways of doing things a lot easier than that,” he added.
Trump had previously raised questions about the numbers of infections and fatalities reported by China, which are also being investigated by the US.
The American president has also suspended US funding of the World Health Organization accusing it of helping China conceal the true extent of its. Trump haas slammed the world body for mismanaging the pandemic, additionally, and for opposing the January ban on travelers from China, which he has touted as his administration’s key response to the epidemic.
