Geneva: The World Health Organization (WHO) has said it is setting up an independent panel to review its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and the response by governments worldwide.
The announcement on Thursday follows strong criticism by US President Donald Trump’s administration, which accused the WHO of being “China-centric”, and US formal notification on Tuesday that it was withdrawing from the United Nations’s agency in a year’s time.
Former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark and former Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf have agreed to head the panel, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
“The magnitude of this pandemic, which has touched virtually everyone in the world, clearly deserves a commensurate evaluation, an honest evaluation,” Tedros told a virtual meeting with representatives of WHO’s 194 member states.
