China restated its case that Covid-19 may have originated in the United States in a white paper on its pandemic response released on Wednesday, after President Donald Trump’s administration blamed a lab leak in China.

The White House launched a Covid-19 website on April 18 in which it said the coronavirus came from a lab leak in China while criticizing former President Joe Biden, former top US health official Anthony Fauci and the World Health Organization (WHO).

In the white paper, released by the official Xinhua news agency, China accused the US of politicizing the matter of the origins of Covid-19. It cited a Missouri lawsuit which resulted in a $24 billion ruling against China for hoarding protective medical equipment and covering up the outbreak.

China shared relevant information with the WHO and the international community in a timely manner, the white paper said, emphasizing that a joint study by the WHO and China had concluded that a lab leak was “extremely unlikely.”

The US should not continue to “pretend to be deaf and dumb,” but should respond to the legitimate concerns of the international community, the white paper said.

“Substantial evidence suggested the Covid-19 might have emerged in the United States earlier than its officially-claimed timeline, and earlier than the outbreak in China,” it said.

The CIA said in January the pandemic was more likely to have emerged from a lab in China than from nature, after the agency had for years said it could not reach a conclusion on the matter. It said it had “low confidence” in its new assessment and noted that both lab origin and natural origin remain plausible.

An official at China’s National Health Commission said the next step in origin-tracing work should focus on the US, according to Xinhua, which cited a statement about the white paper.

Venezuela is demanding that a 2-year-old girl be returned to her family after the United States deported her parents and kept the toddler in government custody.

The Venezuelan foreign ministry on Monday accused the US of “kidnapping” Maikelys Antonella Espinoza Bernal, saying she was separated from her mother as she was boarding a deportation flight back to Venezuela.

It also said the girl’s father, Maiker Espinoza-Escalona, had been deported earlier by the US to a notorious prison in El Salvador.

“(The US) once again committed the extremely serious offense of separating families and removing a minor from her emotional environment and, in particular, from her biological mother,” read a statement from the Venezuelan government on Monday.

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) denied it kidnapped the girl, arguing it was trying to protect her from her parents, whom it accused without evidence of being part of Tren de Aragua (TDA), a Venezuelan gang the US has designated a terror organization.

In a Saturday statement, DHS said the toddler was removed from a deportation flight list “for her safety and welfare.” She remains in the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) and has been placed with a foster family, it added.

The toddler is one of several children to have been affected by the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. Last week, three US citizen children — including a 4-year-old with metastatic cancer — were taken to Honduras with their undocumented mothers as the women were deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. White House border czar Tom Homan said the US removed the children because their mothers “requested” they stay with them rather than remain in the country.

It’s unclear if Maikelys’ mother was given the choice to be deported with her daughter.

A family separated

The toddler and her parents entered the US in May 2024 to seek asylum, according to a court document filed by legal advocacy groups.

On March 29, Maiker was sent to a naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where DHS has transferred migrants, according to court documents filed by his lawyers.

They said he was flown the following day to El Salvador’s notorious Cecot mega-prison, which the US is using to detain hundreds of Venezuelan migrants it accuses of being violent gang members, though it hasn’t provided strong evidence to back that claim.

The toddler’s mother was deported soon after Maiker was sent to El Salvador. She was forced to return to her country on a flight without her 2-year-old child, Venezuela said.

The girl was kept in ORR custody, with DHS saying, “We will not allow this child to be abused and continue to be exposed to criminal activity that endangers her safety.”

Without providing evidence, it alleged in Saturday’s statement that the father was a TDA lieutenant who oversaw various crimes including homicides and trafficking, and that the mother oversaw the recruitment of young women for drug smuggling and prostitution.

Rising anger in Venezuela

Venezuela accused the US of violating international law and said it would take all legal and diplomatic measures to secure the girl’s return.

Its government demanded the “immediate release” of the child and “that the rule of law and the basic rights of our little girl be restored.”

It cited the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which states in part that children should not be separated from their parents against their will unless such separation is necessary for the best interests of the child. The US has signed the convention but has not ratified it.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro insists the US is unjustly holding the child. He announced that a march intended for International Workers’ Day on May 1 would become a rally to demand her release.

“I ask for the full support of the Venezuelan people in the effort we are going to make to rescue this kidnapped girl and to bring back safe and sound — sooner rather than later — the 252 Venezuelans kidnapped in El Salvador,” he said in Caracas Monday, referring to the Venezuelan migrants the US has deported to the Salvadoran prison.

Syria strongly condemned foreign intervention in the country following a rare Israeli strike near Damascus on Wednesday amid deadly sectarian violence.

Syria said the Israeli strike killed at least one security officer and injured several other people.

Earlier on Wednesday Israel’s military said it had carried out a strike on the outskirts of the Syrian capital saying it was targeting an “extremist group” that had attacked the Druze community, a religious minority in the country.

In a joint statement on Wednesday, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz said the operation in the town of Sahnaya, southwest of Damascus, was a “warning action” against an unidentified armed group “preparing to continue attacking the Druze population.”

Syria’s foreign ministry reacted saying it had an “unwavering commitment” to protecting all Syrian people, including the “honorable Druze community.”

According to Syria’s state news agency SANA, Syrian government forces launched a wide-scale operation in the area surrounding Sahnaya to arrest “outlawed gangs” after an unidentified armed group attacked a Syrian government checkpoint late Tuesday, wounding three officers.

Other groups simultaneously opened fire on civilian and security vehicles in nearby areas. Recent violence left at least 11 people dead and dozens injured.

Syria’s top Muslim cleric Osama al-Rifai has called on all Syrians to keep calm and not escalate the situation.

“Everyone must… stay away from calls for revenge and retaliation, and allow justice to take its course,” Rifai said regarding the “recent events,” in Sahnaya,in a statement on Wednesday as cited by SANA.

Since the fall of the Bashar Al Assad regime, Israel has positioned itself as the protector of Syria’s Druze, an Arab community that follows an offshoot of Islam and is predominantly present across Syria, Lebanon and Israel. Wary of a new regime led by former jihadists, a small minority of Druze have welcomed Israel’s overtures, but many others have publicly denounced them.

A sizeable number of Druze live within Israel’s internationally recognized borders, have Israeli citizenship and serve in its military. A large Syrian-Druze population is also present in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights and most have rejected Israeli citizenship and do not traditionally serve in the Israeli military. Within Syria, many Druze live in the south of the country, parts of which Israel declared a buffer zone after Assad’s fall.

“On this Memorial Day for Israel’s fallen soldiers, as we honor the Druze community’s contribution to Israel’s security, we stress our commitment to protect their brethren in Syria,” the joint statement added.

Israeli officials also urged the Syrian government to prevent harm to the Druze community.

On Wednesday evening, the Israeli military said that three Syrian Druze citizens were evacuated into Israel for medical treatment after they were injured in Syria.

The United Nations Special Envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen has expressed his deep concern “at unacceptable violence in Syria especially in suburbs of Damascus,” and ” alarmed at reports of Israeli attacks,” in a statement on Wednesday

” These attacks must stop,” Pedersen said and called for “full respect of Syria’s sovereignty.”