World / China blocks entry to WHO team studying origins of coronavirus

Geneva: World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Tuesday decried China's last-minute decision to block investigators who are researching the origin of the coronavirus.

"Today, we learned that Chinese officials have not yet finalised the necessary permissions for the team's arrivals in China," Tedros told reporters in a rare rebuke of Beijing. "I am very disappointed with this news, given that two members had already begun their journeys and others were not able to travel at the last minute," he said.

Michael Ryan, head of the WHO's emergencies program, called the delay "frustrating."

Ryan said he had made clear to senior Chinese officials "that the mission is a priority for WHO and the international team."

For the past few months, the United Nations body has been working to send a 10-person team of international experts to China to investigate the origins of the virus and how it crossed into humans.

The team, including epidemiologists and animal health specialists, wants to focus its research onWuhan, the home of a wet market reported to be the origin of the human outbreak. However, China is particularly sensitive to the investigation, often pointing to ubsubstantiated reports that it appeared in other countries first. It has also been wary of claims that it may have originated in a laboratory in the same city.