United States President Donald Trump once again on Monday attacked the World Health Organisation, saying the UN health body was a ‘puppet' of China.
Trump claimed that more people would have died from coronavirus in the country had he not imposed a ban on travel from China, which was ‘opposed' by the health agency.
“They (WHO) are a puppet of China. They're China-centric, to put it nicer. But they're a puppet of China,” Trump told reporters at the White House.
“I think they have done a very sad job. The United States pays them USD 450 million a year. China pays them USD 38 million a year,” Trump said in response to a question.
Trump said the World Health Organization was against the imposition of a ban on travel from China in late January.
“The World Health Organization was against it. They were against me doing the ban. They said you don't need it, it's too much, it's too severe, and they turned out to be wrong,” he said.
Trump said Democratic Party's presidential nominee and former vice-president Joe Biden was too against the ban.
“Sleepy Joe Biden said the same thing. He said I was xenophobic. I was xenophobic because I said you can't come in if you come from China. You can't come into our country, very early. And Biden said I was xenophobic,” he said.
“If I didn't do that ban, you would have lost hundreds of thousands of more people in this country. It was a very important ban. People don't like talking about the ban, but it was very important,” the US president said, claiming that it was only he who wanted it.
“We did it and saved thousands of lives, hundreds of thousands of lives probably,” he said.
On Monday, Trump wrote a letter to WHO director general Tedros Ghebreyesus threatening to permanently halt funding for the organisation if it did not commit to improvements within 30 days, and to reconsider the membership of the United States in the global health body.
"If the WHO doesn't commit to major substantive improvements within the next 30 days, I will make my temporary freeze of US funding to WHO permanent and reconsider our membership in the organisation." Trump said in the letter.
Trump had temporarily suspended US' contribution to the WHO last month, accusing it of promoting China's "disinformation" about the coronavirus outbreak, although WHO officials denied the accusation and Beijing said that it was transparent and open.
"The only way forward for the WHO is if it can actually demonstrate independence from China. My administration has already started discussions with you on how to reform the organisation. But action is needed quickly. We do not have time to waste," Trump said in the letter.
"I cannot allow American taxpayer dollars to continue to finance an organisation that, in its present state, is so clearly not serving America's interests," he added.
On Monday, the WHO said that an independent review of the global coronavirus response would begin at the earliest and it received backing from China, where the virus was first discovered.
With inputs from ANI
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