BEIJING : China is "open" to international cooperation to identify the source of the novel coronavirus but any investigation must be "free of political interference", China's foreign minister said Sunday.
Wang Yi blasted what he called efforts by US politicians to "fabricate rumours" about the pathogen's origins and "stigmatise China".
The United States and Australia have called in recent weeks for an investigation into the origins of the pandemic. Both US President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have accused China of a lack of transparency over the issue, and repeatedly pushed the theory that the virus leaked from a Chinese maximum-security laboratory.