Coronavirus: Europeans give WHO qualified backing amid growing wariness over China’s transparency

German foreign minister says filling the funding gap left by the US could ‘encourage others to do the same’, as China faces backlash

White House says G7 leaders’ conversation dominated by ‘lack of transparency and chronic mismanagement of the pandemic by WHO’

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WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and his organisation have been accused of bias towards China. Photo: AFP

Published: 6:00pm, 17 Apr 2020Updated: 11:23pm, 17 Apr 2020

European leaders, stunned by the US’ decision to pull funding for the World Health Organisation, have voiced their support for the UN agency despite calling for it to reform.

Although dismissive of US President Donald Trump’s decision to stop funding the United Nations health body, few European leaders question his claims that the WHO was “China-centric” and leaned too heavily on Beijing’s assertions at the initial stage of the coronavirus outbreak.

The Group of 7 (G7) leaders gave their backing for the WHO following a conference call on Thursday, with a spokesman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel saying a strong and coordinated international response was needed to contain the pandemic. “In this context, she expressed full support for the WHO as well as a number of other partners,” he said in a statement.

European Council President Charles Michel said the G7 would have to lead global efforts “with the existing international organisations and with multilateralism at the core of our action”.

Separately, German foreign minister Heiko Maas cautioned against Berlin increasing WHO funding following Washington’s decision, in what some German politicians called a fear of a similar move by China. Asked whether Germany would up its contribution to fill the gap, Maas told reporters on Thursday it would be “wrong in principle because it can encourage others to do the same”.