Amid anger in France, Beijing denies virus slurs by diplomat

China has downplayed a diplomatic spat between Paris and Beijing over a Chinese embassy report implying that France abandoned elderly patients infected with the coronavirus, leaving them to die. 

Beijing dismissed the incident as a "malentendu," with a spokesperson for China's foreign ministry saying Beijing had never given any negative criticism of France's handling of the coronavirus global pandemic and had no intention of doing so, Radio France International reports.

The French language article, entitled "Restoring distorted facts – Observations of a Chinese diplomat posted to Paris", first appeared on Sunday, the latest in a series of posts and tweets by the embassy that has defended Beijing's response to the coronavirus pandemic, while criticising the West's handling of the outbreak, Reuters reports.

During a parliamentary hearing with Foreign Minister Le Drian on Wednesday, several senators expressed their dismay at the diplomat's comments.

They denied such a declaration existed and demanded to know what the minister had told the envoy and why the article was still on the embassy's website.

Le Drian sidestepped the questions, citing the remarks by China's Foreign Ministry spokesman on Wednesday.

In the post, an unnamed diplomat suggests that careworkers in Western nursing homes – using the French term EHPAD (Établissement d’hébergement pour personnes âgées dépendantes) – had abandoned their jobs, leaving residents to die. It came just days after France had raised its death toll substantially to include nursing homes.

The response came after French foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian summoned China’s ambassador to France to express his “clear disapproval” of recent comments over how France is dealing with the coronavirus crisis.

In a statement released on Tuesday, Le Drian said some public remarks from Chinese officials were not in line with the relationship of “trust and friendship” between French President Emmanuel Macron and Chinese President Xi Jinping.

“Certain recent public stances by representatives of the Chinese Embassy in France are not in keeping with the quality of the bilateral relationship between our two countries or with the relationships of trust and friendship between the French President and President Xi Jinping and between myself and my counterpart, Wang Yi.

"I clearly expressed to the Chinese Ambassador to France my disapproval of certain recent remarks when he was summoned to the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs in the morning of Tuesday 14 April.''

This follows a long statement that was published on the website of China’s embassy to France at the weekend in an apparent response to criticism from Western media, experts and politicians over China’s handling of the virus outbreak.

The statement, presented as written by an unnamed Chinese diplomat in Paris, notably stated that caregivers in French nursing homes had “collectively deserted, letting their residents dying from starvation and disease”.

China's response also expressed a wish for so-called "French parties" to dispel any misunderstanding, not specifying whether the comment was meant to address the French government, media outlets or politicians.

In a tweet issued yesterday, the Chinese embassy in Paris clarified that the incidents of patients being left to die after being abandoned by care workers occurred in Spain, not France.