Donald Trump: Trump’s ‘secret’ demands

In April, President Donald Trump took a very hard line against the World Health Organization (WHO). He accused the organization of taking the outbreak too lightly at first and helping China hide how dangerous and widespread the coronavirus was.

The president froze financial support for the organization.

A few weeks later, he threatened to withdraw support permanently, if the organization did not implement “significant improvements” within 30 days, but did not indicate what these improvements should be.

By that time, the virus had caused 320,000 deaths worldwide, nearly 92,000 of them in the United States, and the president had received harsh criticism for handling the crisis.

He fought back by attacking the WHO and China, and has often referred to the coronavirus as the “China virus,” something for which he has also been criticized. Gro Harlem Brundtland, who led the WHO from 1998 to 2003, was one of those who retaliated against Trump, saying that “the last thing we need now is to attack the WHO.”

Blood Red: – Dramatic

United States pulled

On May 29, the president withdrew the United States from cooperation with the United Nations.

He justified the non-compliance by saying that “the WHO has not introduced reforms” in relation to the handling of the corona pandemic, adding that the United States would rather spend its money elsewhere.

This generated strong reactions in Europe.

Now The New York Times shares details of what happened behind the scenes.

At the end of May, the United States ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Andrew Bremberg, went on a “rescue mission” to WHO headquarters.

He said the relationship could be salvaged and provided a list of seven lawsuits that US officials saw as the beginning of low-key discussions. But when the diplomat met with WHO chief Tedros Ghebreyesus in Geneva, things had changed in Washington, writes The New York Times.

Hours later, the president took the podium in Rosehagen and announced that the United States had broken with the WHO.

– extortion

Diplomats and health officials have stated that the list contained sensible requests, but also allegedly contained politically sensitive, if not inappropriate, demands.

– It wasn’t a negotiation. It was blackmail, says Lawrence Gostin, who has seen the list, to the newspaper.

Gostin is a professor of law at Georgetown University and a long-time adviser to the WHO.

The list was the product of months of mounting irritation over Ghebreyesus, whom senior members of the Trump administration thought were quick to brag about China or portray the outbreak in a favorable light for Beijing.

Ghebreyesus, for his part, must have felt he was trapped between China and the United States.

Among the requirements were:

• Investigation of WHO’s handling of the outbreak and source of the virus.

  This summer came news that the WHO launched a panel that would look at where and how the virus originated and how to prevent future outbreaks, as well as how the outbreak has been handled, according to NTB.

• The United States wanted Ghebreyesus to ask China to provide virus samples and stop censoring Chinese doctors or journalists.
• The United States wanted the WHO leader to say that countries were right when considering travel restrictions during the pandemic.

According to the newspaper, the request was interpreted as a demand that he say that the president was right in initiating travel restrictions against China. Ghebreyesus did not want to be involved in the US election campaign, where Trump used travel restrictions as an argument that he had handled the crisis well.

• WHO was to send a team to Taiwan to study the country’s successful pandemic response.

As of October, 200 days had passed without a domestic infection in Taiwan, according to NTB. According to Worldometers, a total of 639 cases and seven deaths have been recorded. But Taiwan is a sensitive issue. The Beijing authorities see the island as part of China and have announced that they will one day take it back, if necessary by force.