Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is sharpening his denunciation of the World Health Organization, saying that “corrupt” leadership bears responsibility for the coronavirus pandemic.
“It’s become corrupt,” Pompeo told a Danish radio outlet while traveling in Copenhagen. “An epidemic broke out, killing hundreds of thousands of people all across the world. Trillions of dollars lost in economic wealth. All as a direct result of the Chinese Communist Party covering up and doing it with a complicit World Health Organization.”
Pompeo offered that rebuke to explain the U.S. withdrawal from the WHO. The attack comes on the heels of a private accusation, reportedly delivered in London, that drew a public response from the United Nations agency.
“We strongly reject any ad hominem attacks and unfounded allegations,” the WHO said late Tuesday. “WHO urges countries to remain focused on tackling the pandemic that is causing tragic loss of life and suffering.”
That statement was delivered in response to a report that Pompeo, while meeting in private with British lawmakers in London, said that Chinese officials “bought” the loyalty of WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
“When push came to shove, when it really mattered most, when there was a pandemic in China, Dr. Tedros, who was … bought by the Chinese government, I can’t say more, but I can tell, I’m saying this on a firm intelligence foundation, a deal was made,” Pompeo told China hawks at the Henry Jackson Society on Tuesday, according to the Telegraph. “There was a deal-making election, and when push came to shove, you get dead Britons because of the deal that was made.”
Tedros has turned into a lightning rod during the pandemic, in part for praising Beijing’s “transparency” in the early days of the outbreak even though agency officials were frustrated by the lack of information provided by the regime.
“That’s not an organization that the United States wants to spend roughly half a billion dollars a year supporting,” Pompeo said Wednesday. “We want to support institutions that are functional and work, and we’ll make sure that we do our part to make sure that each of those institutions does just that.”
