For years, the German government kept hidden a report by its Foreign Intelligence Service that suggested a lab-based origin for COVID-19 was highly probable, according to an investigative story from two prominent German newspapers. The inquiry, co-published by Die Zeit and Sueddeutscher Zeitung, reveals that Germany’s intelligence service (BND) gathered in Berlin shortly after SARS-CoV-2 emerged in early 2020 for a mission called “Project Saaremaa,” named after a small island in the Baltic Sea, Estonia.
The agents involved in “Project Saaremaa” broke through the information blockade imposed by Chinese authorities and retrieved unpublished data and documents from Wuhan, the reports say. This critical information was then shared with the BND’s scientists. A specialized group of virologists at the BND, using the secret intelligence and the available scientific literature from Wuhan — including data from Shi Zhengli’s research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology — concluded that the likelihood of COVID-19 originating in a lab was about 80 to 95%. Their findings were likely completed sometime in 2020.
Key unpublished theses about coronaviruses and their effects on the brain were pivotal to the BND’s evaluation, according to the newspapers. Further revelations in late 2021 may have strengthened the BND’s position. The investigation hints that the German intelligence’s conclusions may have influenced the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s revised stance in January. On January 25, 2025, the CIA adjusted its public assessment from undecided to a lab origin, with low confidence. This shift reportedly followed encouragement from CIA Director John Ratcliffe, although the agency had updated its internal position earlier, the New York Times notes. Ratcliffe has since criticized the CIA for being overly influenced by political considerations. Similarly, the German press indicates that the German government hesitated to make the BND’s findings public, concerned about the geopolitical fallout that might arise.
The newspapers also claim that Wolfgang Schmidt, Chief of Staff at the Chancellery, was briefed by the BND president about their conclusion that COVID-19 had originated in a lab. In May 2023, Schmidt reportedly discussed the findings with Avril Haines, Director of National Intelligence, but Haines minimized the conclusions of U.S. agencies like the Department of Energy that supported a lab origin, according to the newspapers.
Germany’s reluctance to reveal its findings might have been influenced by prominent virologists like Christian Drosten, who is widely referred to as “Germany’s Anthony Fauci,” and who insisted that the virus had a natural origin, according to the reports. Drosten was part of a brief private discussion with figures like Francis Collins, Director of the National Institutes of Health, Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Jeremy Farrar, then-director of the Wellcome Trust, to discuss how to handle growing speculation about the Wuhan Institute of Virology. This was all uncovered through Slack messages and emails subpoenaed by the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic.
The BND began revisiting the evidence with the help of external German experts, including Drosten, in regular monthly meetings starting in December 2024. The BND is now preparing to brief the World Health Organization on its findings, following the publication of the newspapers’ investigation. This new information comes after National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan assigned the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to form a panel that would reassess the origins of the pandemic just before the end of the Biden administration.
In the United Kingdom, Baroness Merron, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Health and Social Care, responded to the CIA’s updated assessment in February, stating that the British government would “continually review our own assessment of the origins of the virus, considering any new intelligence.” She added, “We will update the House of Commons and the House of Lords as and when there is anything new to say.”
{Matzav.com}
Fauci lied and people died.