It was interesting to watch the White House desperately trying to undo what its master had said — that Russian President Vladimir Putin “cannot remain in power”. Earlier, Hunter Biden, son of the US president, was revealed to be involved in Ukrainian biological laboratories.
On March 25 — the day before President Joe Biden, in a speech in Warsaw, expressed what he later called “my outrage” and letting personal emotions overtake his presidency — London’s Daily Mail reported that “Hunter Biden did help secure millioxns in funding for a US contractor in Ukraine specializing in deadly pathogen research”. This was later confirmed by the New York Post, with Hunter’s emails obtained from a computer he had “forgotten” about, having left it at a repair shop in Delaware.
By way of background, it has been fairly well documented that the United States has some 400 bacteriological laboratories around the world, including about two dozen in Ukraine. Although not all were “owned” by the Americans, they were part-financed by the US Department of Defense.
The department said its biological threat reduction program was working with partner countries, including Ukraine, to combat the threat of outbreaks (intentional, accidental, or natural) of the world’s most dangerous infectious diseases. The functioning of the so-called “American” biolaboratories in Ukraine started during the presidency of Viktor Yushchenko in 2005. In 2013, Ukraine abandoned its cooperation with the US, but one year later it was restarted during the presidency of Petro Poroshenko.
The involvement of the Biden family in the Ukrainian biolabs surfaced on March 24 during the Russian military operation in Ukraine. Russian State Duma speaker Vyacheslav Volodin revealed on state media that an investment fund run by Hunter Biden financed research and the implementation of the US military biological program.
US intelligence officials had earlier dismissed Russia’s claims of a US military bio-program, explaining that Ukraine’s network of biological labs was “researching pathogens” for which they had publicly received funding from Washington. However, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki claimed on March 9 that reports of biolabs in Ukraine were fake news propagated by Russia.
It is no surprise they did not mention Hunter Biden’s involvement in raising funds for the labs.
In 2009, Hunter Biden started a company — Rosemont Seneca Technology Partners — with Christopher Heinz, stepson of former secretary of state John Kerry. The company invested $500,000 in Metabiota, a pathogen research company headquartered in San Francisco.
Then, in a separate story on March 17 into a federal tax investigation into Hunter’s business dealings, The New York Times confirmed that the emails on Hunter’s computer were authentic.
The emails revealed Hunter Biden introduced Metabiota to officials at Burisma, the Ukrainian gas company where he was a highly paid board member, for a “science project” involving biolabs in Ukraine.
“I don’t think I made a mistake in taking a spot on that board. I think I made a mistake in terms of underestimating the way it would be used against me,” he said of the $50,000-a-month gig that raised eyebrows and ignited a political firestorm because his father was serving as vice-president in the Obama administration at the time.
Metabiota has worked in Ukraine for Black & Veatch, a US defense contractor with ties to military intelligence agencies, which built secure labs in Ukraine, according to the Daily Mail.
According to the emails, Metabiota’s then vice-president Mary Guttieri wrote to Hunter Biden about geopolitical issues involving the company’s research in the former Soviet republic, two months after Russia annexed the Crimea region.
“As promised, I’ve prepared the attached memo, which provides an overview of Metabiota, our engagement in Ukraine, and how we can potentially leverage our team, networks, and concepts to assert Ukraine’s cultural and economic independence from Russia and continued integration into Western society,” her memo read.
Black & Veatch had been commissioned in 2010 by the US Defense Department’s Defense Threat Reduction Agency to build a lab in Odessa, Ukraine, to “enhance the government’s existing surveillance systems to detect, report and respond to bioterrorism attacks, epidemics and potential pandemics”, the company’s website said.
The US embassy in Ukraine posted on its website that the US Defense Department’s International Counterproliferation Program provides hands-on training for the National Police of Ukraine, the Security Service of Ukraine, and the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine.
“Workshops are tailored to focus on chemical, biological, or other WMD-related investigations,” the embassy website said, referring to weapons of mass destruction.
Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland, during testimony before a US Senate committee on March 8, admitted to the existence of biological research labs in Ukraine. She said the US was “working with the Ukrainians on how they can prevent any of those research materials from falling into the hands of Russian forces”.
A 2012 report by the US’ National Academy of Sciences said that some Ukrainian labs have been upgraded to the level needed to handle more dangerous pathogens such as anthrax and cholera. And Russia claimed that evidence it seized in Ukraine showed some pathogens were transported to the US.
Meanwhile, the World Health Organization advised Ukraine to destroy high-threat pathogens stored in the country’s labs to prevent “any potential spills”.
Hunter Biden and those responsible at the US Defense Department owe the world a clarified account of the biolab programs they funded.
The author is a former chief information officer for the Hong Kong government and a veteran journalist.
The views expressed do not necessarily represent those of China Daily.