Is a Chinese defector the reason Biden administration wants an investigation into Lab Leak Theory?

[Sympthsical]

Interesting article from the Daily Beast.

Chinese-language anti-communist media and Twitter are abuzz this week with rumors that a vice minister of State Security, Dong Jingwei defected in mid-February, flying from Hong Kong to the United States with his daughter, Dong Yang.

Dong Jingwei supposedly gave the U.S. information about the Wuhan Institute of Virology that changed the stance of the Biden administration concerning the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dong is, or was, a longtime official in China’s Ministry of State Security (MSS), also known as the Guoanbu. His publicly available background indicates that he was responsible for the Ministry’s counterintelligence efforts in China, i.e., spy-catching, since being promoted to vice minister in April 2018. If the stories are true, Dong would be the highest-level defector in the history of the People’s Republic of China.

Dong’s defection was raised by Chinese officials last March at the Sino-American summit in Alaska, according to Dr. Han Lianchao, a former Chinese foreign ministry official before defecting after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. In a Wednesday tweet, Han, citing an unnamed source, alleged that China’s foreign minister Wang Yi and Communist Party foreign affairs boss Yang Jiechi demanded that the Americans return Dong, and U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken refused.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/rumors-of-us-secretly-harboring-top-china-official-dong-jingwei-swirl

Are we ready to stop calling it all a conspiracy theory yet?

[WHITT]

1. Well

Are we ready to stop calling it all a conspiracy theory yet?

Nope.

Unless the "defector" can explain how there were cases in Italy at least two months prior to cases in China.

[Sympthsical]

4. You're hanging your hat on an antibody study

Which isn't necessarily Covid-19. Just a coronavirus that may be similar.

Lots of caveats in the reporting. Possibly. Could be. Etc.

But, as evidence points more and more towards the lab, I suppose one hold fast to that.

[WHITT]

11. Nope

A further SARS-CoV-2 antibodies test was carried out by the University of Siena for the same research titled “Unexpected detection of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in the pre-pandemic period in Italy”.

It showed that four cases dating back to the first week of October were positive for antibodies, meaning they had got infected in September...

https://www.reuters.com/article/health-coronavirus-italy-timing/researchers-find-coronavirus-was-circulating-in-italy-earlier-than-thought-idUSKBN27W1J2


That's three months prior to the WHO finding cases in China in December, and two months before the 'stand on your head and rub your tummy' contorted conspiracy theory.

[David__77]

2. It's a motivator of fascists, racists, and Falun Gong.

…

[blm]

3. This repeats the Daily Mail 'report'.

Daily Mail is where a lot of RightWing propagandists plant their stories.

Smarter to wait for a more credible source.

[Sympthsical]

5. Things are either true or they are not

It is noted right away that this is a rumor, and the source of the rumor is given.

[blm]

7. Rumor emanating from untrustworthy sources.

Things are either true or they are not.

Way premature to give this ‘rumor’ planted in RW propaganda networks credibility.

Why push it as credible here? When it’s credible most of us will recognize it.

[Sympthsical]

9. And there we are

"Don't like what's being said, go after messenger." Every time.

You know Democrats are well behind the rest of the country in looking at the Wuhan lab and trying to figure out what went on. Even the Biden administration did an about face and decided this needed to be looked at.

People are now behind the Biden administration on this.

Anti-science head in the sand partisanship, IMO.

[blm]

12. No. I'm a longtime Fairness and Accuracy In Media advocate.

Being skeptical of a story based only in rumor generated by RightWing propaganda media is appropriate at this point.

[rockfordfile]

14. You sound like a Russian plant.

Yes it would be looked into.

[Lancero]

6. Not only that, it also originates from Red State.

Wonder why they're so reluctant to post a link to the original source?

[rockfordfile]

13. I agree

[Xoan]

8. Interesting article from SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST ...

Published: 10:23pm, 18 Jun, 2021

China’s top spy catcher has urged the country’s intelligence officers to step up their efforts to hunt down foreign agents and insiders who collude with “anti-China” forces.

Dong Jingwei, the vice-minister of state security, made the comments on Friday at a seminar on a counter-espionage regulation that came into effect in April.

A report on the event posted on Changanjian, the social media account operated by China’s top law enforcement agency, the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission, did not specify where the seminar was held.

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3137958/top-chinese-spy-catcher-dong-jingwei-warns-agents-look-out

[Sympthsical]

10. Is interesting n/t