International Desk : There was no evidence that the Covid-19 virus was created in the Chinese government's Wuhan research lab, said the head of US intelligence on Friday.

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The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) said they had no information backing recent claims that three scientists at the lab were some of the very first infected with Covid-19 and may have created the virus themselves.

The ODNI report said some scientists at the Wuhan lab had done genetic engineering of coronaviruses similar to Covid-19.

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But the US "has no information" indicating they had done such work on the specific Covid-9 virus, known as SARS-CoV-2, or on any "close progenitor, or a backbone virus that is closely related-enough to have been the source of the pandemic."

The report, made for Congress and carrying an unreleased classified annex, came three months after lawmakers demanded a fuller explanation of US intelligence's information on the origins of the pandemic which erupted at the end of 2019.

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ODNI said the intelligence community remained divided on whether the pandemic arose from a natural occurence of the virus -- perhaps transferred from animals like bats -- or a from lab leak.

The report said the Wuhan lab had done pathogen research and vaccine development together with the People's Liberation Army (PLA) "for public health needs."

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But the coronaviruses used in this research "were too distantly related to have led to the creation of SARS-CoV-2," the report said.

Sun News/MR

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