Reports: German intel agency collected evidence of Covid-19 lab leak

Yahoo

12-03-2025

Germany's BND intelligence agency reportedly gathered plausible evidence that the coronavirus pandemic originated with a laboratory leak in the Chinese city of Wuhan, according to reports by three newspapers on Wednesday.
The BND and Germany's Chancellery had asked scientists to examine the evidence over recent months, although the outcome of that assessment was not immediately available, according to reports in the NZZ, Süddeutsche and Die Zeit newspapers.
The so-called "lab leak" theory has long been a prominent but controversial explanation for the deadly global pandemic.
It posits that the Sars-CoV-2 virus originated from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which conducted research on coronaviruses, and began spreading through some sort of accident or failure at the lab.
The other major theory for the pandemic's origin is that the virus had a purely natural origin, just like the SARS outbreak in 2002-3.
Not all researchers involved in the BND round were equally convinced that the virus clearly came from the laboratory, according to the NZZ.
Some see the probability of a man-made pandemic from the institute growing steadily, but have not yet wanted to commit themselves.
Deputy government spokeswoman Christiane Hoffmann told journalists in Berlin that they had taken note of the reports. However, it was not possible to comment on intelligence findings and activities.
She said that the responsible committees of the German parliament, which meet in secret, would be informed in such matters.
In January, US President Donald Trump's newly appointed director of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), John Ratcliffe, changed his agency's assessment of the origin of the coronavirus as one of his first official acts.