Staff members do nucleic acid testing work at a novel coronavirus detection lab in Wuhan, central China's Hubei Province, Feb. 22, 2020. (Xinhua/Cheng Min)

Moscow considers US accusations against China regarding the spread of the coronavirus to be totally groundless and dishonest, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov has announced.

"We are naturally watching the accusations being made by Washington against the PRC, our strategic partner, with concern and anxiety," Ryabkov said, speaking at the Valdai discussion club on Thursday. "We have repeatedly stated our position on this issue, and it boils down to the fact that there are no reasons to blame China for doing anything that was untimely, wrong or inadequate during the entire period of its fight with the COVID-19 virus."

According to the senior diplomat, while Russia has been calling on US authorities to take a more responsible approach to issues such as funding of the World Health Organizations, instead, Moscow has seen a trend in the opposite direction.

"We see how politicians, diplomats and senior figures in the executive branch in Washington literally on a daily basis multiply their list of complaints against China, and try to impose an anti-Chinese discourse among the entire international community," the Russian diplomat added.

The diplomat suggested that, at least for the duration of the current crisis, countries must "at least temporarily abandon their own selfish approaches and notions" in favour of finding a common approach to solve problems affecting all of humanity as soon as possible, to figure out "the most effective way to confront the pandemic and find opportunities to restart the world economy with the least possible damage to all of civilization and to each individual country."

The two countries have engaged in increasingly virulent rhetoric with Washington claiming that Beijing 'covered up' the true extent of its infection rates, and threatening to sanction and sue the Asian nation for damages caused by COVID-1. China warned it would retaliate.