BEIJING (AP) — China said Thursday it is providing COVID-19 vaccines to nearly 40 African countries, describing its actions as purely altruistic in an apparent intensification of what has been described as “vaccine diplomacy." Director of the Chinese Foreign Ministry's Africa Department, Wu Peng, center right, prepares for a briefing in Beijing on Thursday, May 20, 2021. Wu told reporters on Thursday that China is currently providing COVID-19 vaccines to nearly 40 African countries and that the vaccines were either being donated or sold at "favorable prices." (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan) The vaccines were donated or sold at “favorable prices,” Foreign Ministry official Wu Peng told reporters. Wu compared China’s outreach to the actions of “some countries that have said they have to wait for their own people to finish the vaccination before they could supply the vaccines to foreign countries,” in an apparent dig at the United States. “We believe that it is, of course, nece