BEIJING, January 7 (INP): On the issue of COVID-19 origin-tracing, China has always been open, transparent and responsible, said Hua Chunying, spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry here at a regular news briefing

China took the lead in carrying out scientific cooperation in tracing the origin with WHO with the purpose of promoting international research on origin-tracing.

The spokesperson elaborated, " in February and July last year, when China was faced with daunting domestic epidemic prevention and control tasks, China invited WHO experts to China twice to carry out cooperation on origin-tracing and formulate the China part of a global scientific cooperation plan on origin-tracing.

In October last year, the Chinese side reached agreement on the members of the international expert group. Since then, the experts of the two sides have maintained frequent interactions.

Four video meetings were held on October 30, December 3, December 10 and December 18 respectively. With a scientific attitude, Chinese experts shared the outcomes of China's origin-tracing efforts in a science-based and candid manner, and the cooperation between the two sides has made positive progress.

Recently, in a positive and constructive attitude, China has maintained close communication with WHO on the expert panel's trip to China for cooperation on origin-tracing.

At present, the global pandemic situation remains very serious, and China is also making all-out efforts to prevent and control the epidemic.

Chinese health and epidemic prevention departments and experts are devoting themselves to intense anti-epidemic work.

Having all this said, in order to support international COVID-19 cooperation, China has overcome difficulties, accelerated preparatory work at home and tried its best to create favorable conditions for the international expert team's visit to China. WHO knows that clearly.

The issue of origin-tracing is very complicated. In order to ensure the smooth progress of the work of the international expert group in China, necessary procedures need to be fulfilled and relevant specific arrangements need to be made. At present, the two sides are still in discussions."

INP/javed