Competing US views on origins of Covid reveal deeper splits over China policy

The FBI chief, Chris Wray, has endorsed the theory that the Covid pandemic was the result of a laboratory leak in China, further sharpening an increasingly combative bilateral relationship. In making his intervention, Wray, who was appointed by Donald Trump, was also taking sides in an internal debate over Covid's origins, which has become a proxy for a broader tussle between hawks and doves within the administration. The Biden White House has sought to strike a balance between confronting Beijing over what it sees as unacceptable behaviour and trying to slow a slide towards a dangerous confrontation, which has the…