The implications of this are enormous and represent a major problem for the federal health bureaucracy, several intelligence agencies, and the news media, to say nothing of politicians in both parties (but particularly those on the Democratic side) who've deflected public interest from the Wuhan Institute and gain-of-function research. The secrets of both the pandemic's origin and the reason for America's at-best-sluggish investigation of same have become the mother of all political footballs, and today's news is likely to be just the first in a series of loud surprises.

The bulk of this investigation was done by Michael and the Publicteam, who've been digging into this matter with impressive ferocity for a while now. My part was more incidental, and I'm a bit hamstrung in talking about the nature of it, except to say that in addition to the material Michael dug up in today's article, numerous federal agencies appear to have designed their probes of Covid-19's origins so as to discount the possibility of lab origin in advance.

We were told, for instance, that despite longstanding interest in the Wuhan Institute as a potential security concern, at least one intelligence agency overruled a majority of its in-house investigators to produce a report on the pandemic's origin discounting the lab-leak hypothesis.

The "patient zero" report is likely to focus even more attention on stories by publications ranging from the Washington Post to the Intercept to the Wall Street Journal about U.S.-funded "gain-of-function" research, which sources insist is the likely reason many agencies (with the notable exception of the FBI and the Department of Energy, which both pointed at lab origin as a possible explanation) were steered away from the Wuhan Institute as a possible outbreak source.

Moscow outlines conditions for use of nuclear weapons

© Sputnik / Maxim BogodvidMaria Zakharova, Director of the Department of Information and Press, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation.

Russia could potentially resort to nuclear weapons only if its very existence were to be put at risk, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Thursday.

Speaking on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF), which is being attended by delegates from more than 100 countries, Zakharova reiterated that Moscow regards its nuclear weapons as a last-ditch defensive measure.

"Russia's nuclear deterrent policies are purely defensive in nature, and the hypothetical use of nuclear weapons is clearly limited to extraordinary circumstances," Zakharova said.

She explained that those could include an attack on Russia or its allies involving nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction, or "a conventional aggression that threatens the very existence of the state."

"This fundamental point remains unchanged," she stressed.

The spokeswoman went on to reiterate that "Russia is fully committed to the principle that a nuclear war should never be fought." "There could be no winners in it," she said, urging other nuclear countries to embrace this stance as well.

Zakharova's remarks come after last week Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Moscow would start the deployment of tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus in early July once all the required facilities are ready. Russia first announced plans to place such weapons in the neighboring country in March in response to the UK having decided to equip Ukraine with depleted-uranium shells.

Commenting on the matter on Thursday, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg denounced Russia's nuclear rhetoric as "reckless" and said that the US-led military bloc is closely monitoring the situation. However, he noted that "so far, we haven't seen any changes in the [Russian] nuclear posture that requires any changes in our posture."

Fears that Russia might use its vast nuclear arsenal amid the Ukraine conflict were rekindled in the West after late last year Putin signaled that Moscow would use "all the means available to us" to defend its people and territory. However, senior Russian officials have on numerous occasions insisted that Moscow is not threatening anyone with nuclear weapons.

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