Miles Yu : The Chinese Communist Party must be directly responsible for COVID-19

 Direct translation

The epic finale is approaching! The CCP has created a global catastrophe

—Miles Yu : The CCP must be directly responsible for the Wuhan Catastrophe—Latest Commentary from the Hudson Institute

Reporter : Wang Duruo / Editor : Fang Xun /  https://www.aboluowang.com/2026/0820/2423245.html

On Wednesday, 18 August 2026, Miles Yu, director of the China Center at the Hudson Institute and former chief advisor on China policy at the U.S. State Department, published a commentary in The Washington Times and on the Hudson Institute's website entitled "The Chinese Communist Party Must Answer for the Wuhan Abomination." The article explicitly states that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) bears direct responsibility for the outbreak of COVID-19 and calls on the international community to hold it accountable morally, legally, and financially.

Yu begins his article by writing, "Six years after the COVID-19 pandemic brought the world to its knees, the era of euphemisms is over." He emphasizes that this disaster, which has claimed approximately 14.5 million lives and severely damaged the global economy, is not simply a "natural accident," but is closely related to the CCP's totalitarian regime, the blind expansion of dangerous biological experiments, and systematic cover-ups.

Key Arguments and Evidence

The article's core arguments include:

Increasingly Confirmed Laboratory Origin: In June 2026, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) publicly described the U.S.-funded Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) coronavirus research as "now widely regarded as the unintentional source of the outbreak." WIV accumulated over 15,000 bat virus samples, becoming China's first Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) laboratory, yet handled the most dangerous pathogens with a biosafety rating of only "good."

Early Warnings of Safety Risks: Dr. Yuan Zhiming, director of the WIV BSL-4 laboratory, and others warned in 2018 that biosafety laboratories are a "double-edged sword," and mismanagement could lead to "disaster." A SARS leak occurred in a Beijing laboratory in 2004. Shi Zhengli's team participated in constructing a chimeric SARS-like coronavirus in 2015 and warned of a possible similar outbreak in China in March 2019.

Systematic Cover-Up by the CCP: In the early stages of the outbreak, WIV was ordered to destroy samples (1 January 2020) and placed under the control of the People's Liberation Army. The CCP concealed early genetic sequences, animal market information, and laboratory data. The World Health Organization (WHO) disclosed in 2025 that China still had not provided hundreds of early sequences and related data. Xi Jinping himself acknowledged shortcomings in biosafety management on 14 February 2020.

Yu Maochun pointed out that the CCP's first reaction was to suppress the truth, rather than issue timely warnings, leading to the global loss of control of the pandemic. He emphasized: "A government cannot destroy or withhold evidence and then demand exemption from responsibility because of the lack of evidence."

Calling for Accountability

The article concludes by calling on the international community to:

Demand full access to the WIV virus database, laboratory records, biosafety documents, and personnel files;

Allow independent investigators to question relevant personnel without CCP oversight;

Establish a mandatory international consequences mechanism for countries that conceal the epidemic;

Sovereignty cannot be an excuse to endanger all of humanity.

Yu Maochun concluded: “The world has the right to know the truth, the victims deserve justice, and the CCP must take moral, legal, and financial responsibility for the COVID-19 pandemic.”

The Hudson Institute’s official Twitter account subsequently retweeted and emphasized: “The CCP bears direct responsibility for the deadly COVID-19 outbreak. The whole world has the right to know the truth, and the CCP must be held accountable for this catastrophic crime that occurred in Wuhan.” This content quickly spread on social media.

This article was published on the sixth anniversary of the pandemic, further promoting international discussion on the origin of the virus and accountability. Yu Maochun, as a key advisor to the State Department on CCP policy during Trump's first term, has long advocated a hardline stance against the CCP, and his views have significant influence in U.S. political circles.