BEIJING (AP) – A commotion carried by China over Canadian T-shirts bearing a modified logo of New York hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan continued on Wednesday, and China’s Foreign Ministry said it would not buying the canadian explanation of is not a coronavirus related insult.
The Canadian Foreign Ministry said this week that T-shirts that wore the Wu-Tang clan’s “W” logo, but replaced the group’s name with “Wuhan,” were not intended to be light. He apologized for any misunderstanding.
The Chinese-made T-shirts were reportedly ordered last summer by someone at the Canadian embassy in Beijing and their news began circulating recently on the internet in China.
Chinese critics say the “W” is actually a bat and that the shirt means it involves a connection between animals and the virus outbreak in Wuhan City, playing with a stereotype about the Chinese taste for eating exotic species. . The virus that causes COVID-19 is suspected to originate in bats and its outbreak was first detected in Wuhan.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters on Wednesday that Canada’s explanation so far “was not convincing.”
“The malfunctioning of the Canadian personnel in question has already caused a blatant impact and has caused strong resentment and discontent among the normal Chinese people,” Wang said. “The Canadian side should take the matter seriously and give a clear explanation to the Chinese side as soon as possible.”
On Wednesday, Canadian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Christelle Chartrand said in a statement that “The T-shirt logo designed by an embassy member shows a stylized W and is not intended to represent a bat. It was created for the embassy staff team working on the repatriation of Canadians from Wuhan in early 2020. ”
“It was a personal initiative of an employee and was not approved by the Embassy or Global Affairs Canada. We regret the misunderstanding,” Chartrand said in an email.
The controversy is another annoyance for relations between countries that have known in the past two years for China’s demand that Canada release a senior executive from communications giant Huawei who is wanted for fraud charges in the United States.
Meng Wanzhou, who is also the daughter of the company’s founder, denies the charges. China says its case has political motivation as part of a U.S. effort to stifle the nation’s global economic expansion. Her lawyers argue that she has been the subject of abuse of process and that she should be released.
Canada arrested Meng at Vancouver Airport in late 2018. In apparent retaliation, China arrested former Canadian diplomat Michael Kovrig and Canadian businessman Michael Spavor, imposed restrictions on several Canadian exports to China and to sentence to death a Canadian drug smuggler sentenced in a new sudden trial.