In May 2020, German newspaper Der Spiegel reported that China's paramount leader Xi Jinping had asked the WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, on a 21 January phone call, to hold off on issuing a global warning or reporting human-to-human transmission.[63] The WHO denied that Ghebreyesus and Xi had spoken on that date and added that the two had never spoken by phone.[64] The WHO also noted that China had already confirmed human-to-human transmission on 20 January.[64]