Delhi

Coronavirus has imposed a worldwide curfew, the most popular sites lie deserted. There are more than 1,80,000 confirmed cases and over 7000 have died.

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More than 150 countries are fighting the outbreak. Major cities are under lockdown and millions are confined to their homes.

Economic activity is grinding to a halt. The only factory that's running overtime is the one that produces Chinese propaganda.

They're sparing no effort to deflect blame for the outbreak. China wants the world to believe that the coronavirus did not originate there.

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Chinese diplomats are aggressively pushing conspiracy theories to spread that coronavirus originated in the United States of America (USA). They claim there's evidence that the virus was not made in China. And they are doing so mainly to shrug off scrutiny.

Now, US President Donald Trump has called Coronavirus the 'Chinese virus'. Never one to take it lying low, China is responding in kind. A statement from Beijing says that they are very angry with what they call America's smear campaign.  

"Recently some US politicians have linked the novel coronavirus to China. This is a smear of China. We are very angry and strongly oppose it. We urge the US side to correct their mistakes and stop the groundless accusation of China immediately," said Chinese foreign ministry spokesman, Geng Shuang.

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This is rich coming from China, which has been blaming the US army for the Wuhan virus.

China claims it fought the virus well and gave the rest of the world the time to prepare. It justifies its ruthless crackdown on patients and whistleblowers and calls the western response to the outbreak - chaotic.  

However, the truth is China tried to hide the outbreak. There is no doubt that the Chinese people were the worst sufferers of this outbreak, but the Chinese state deserves no sympathy, let alone praise.

China's new narrative on the coronavirus is designed for both the domestic and the international audience. It makes the communist party look strong at home. Ideally, China should help smaller countries, ramp-up efforts to contain the disease 

A good place to begin will be an admission, that the virus originated in China and timely action could have averted this global crisis.