The FBI has for the first time made clear its assessment on the origins of COVID-19—with the bureau's director, Christopher Wray, saying on Fox News Tuesday that it believes the virus leaked from a Chinese laboratory.
“The FBI has for quite some time now assessed that the origins of the pandemic are most likely a potential lab incident in Wuhan,” Wray told Fox’s Bret Baier. “Here you are talking about a potential leak from a Chinese government-controlled lab.”
The interview comes on the heels of a Feb. 26 story from The Wall Street Journal, which cited a classified report by the U.S. Energy Department that came to the same conclusion after being previously undecided on the issue.
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However, it dubbed the assessment with “low confidence”—while the FBI has declared its determination comes with “moderate confidence.”
In his Tuesday interview, Wray said: “So, here you’re talking about a potential leak from a Chinese government-controlled lab that killed millions of Americans, and that’s precisely what that capability was designed for.”
“I should add that our work related to this continues. And there are not a whole lot of details I can share that aren’t classified.”
Eight agencies in total have investigated COVID’s origins, according to an Aug. 2021 report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Four agencies and the National Intelligence Council concluded with low confidence that COVID emerged as a result of natural transmission from animals to humans, while two have yet to come to a conclusion.
Read it at Fox News
