U.S. and China clash at WHO over Taiwan participation

The #UnitedStates urged the World Health Organization (#WHO ) on Thursday (February 6) to "engage directly with #Taiwan public health authorities" in the fight against #coronavirus .

Taiwan is not a WHO member because of China's objections. Beijing says the island is a wayward Chinese province and not a country and is adequately represented in the organisation by #China .

"For the rapidly evolving coronavirus, it is a technical imperative that WHO present visible public health data on Taiwan as an affected area and engage directly with Taiwan public health authorities on actions," Andrew Bremberg, U.S. ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, told the WHO's Executive Board.

China's delegation took the floor to express its "strong dissatisfaction" that some countries had raised the issue of Taiwan's participation during the technical meeting.

In a thinly-veiled reference to Taiwan and Hong Kong, Japan called WHO officials not to "make a geographical vacuum" by preventing regions from joining the agency even as an observer.