1 / 9China’s State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi, on Sunday, minced no words in declaring that his country wouldn’t pay any compensation for the coronavirus pandemic.2 / 9While addressing a press conference on the sidelines of the third session of the 13th National People's Congress (NPC), Wang said those who think that Beijing will pay compensation for the global coronavirus pandemic are ‘daydreaming’.3 / 9Wang’s curt statement comes as a rude reminder of Beijing’s heavy-handed approach towards foreign policy matters calling its bluff.4 / 9The statement stands in stark contrast, albeit in its tone, to the Chinese diplomat's earlier statement that his country welcomes international efforts to identify the source of the deadly pathogen - which the US had claimed to be a lab in Wuhan.5 / 9Chinese foreign minister's statement should be viewed in the backdrop of unrelenting statements from United States President Donald Trump putting the blame squarely on China for the pandemic and deaths back home.6 / 9The two countries have been embroiled in a mud-slinging match to pin the blame on each other for the source of the virus. While US President Trump has floated some curious theories, even opining that the virus may have “escaped” from a lab in Wuhan, China has been equally absurd in its claims.7 / 9Lijian Zhao, an official spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs once insinuated that the virus was brought to China by US soldiers.8 / 9The origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, a zoonotic coronavirus pathogen, notwithstanding, it was later established that Beijing did, in fact, cover-up about the human-to-human transmission of virus initially which led to its outbreak worldwide.9 / 9The first cases of which surfaced in China’s Wuhan city in the country’s Hubei province in November and later spread to the entire planet infecting over 5 million people and killing more than 340,000 globally.