By Gabriela Baczynska, Philip Blenkinsop and Elizabeth Piper
BRUSSELS, March 10 (Reuters) – Britain on Wednesday denied the European Union’s accusation of having banned exports of COVID-19 vaccines, summoning an EU diplomat to complain.
Britain, which left the EU last year, has supplied doses of vaccines to more than a third of its population, far outnumbering the remaining 27 EU members.
European countries, in turn, have blamed pharmaceutical companies for failing to meet supply targets, including AstraZeneca, which makes COVID-19 vaccines in both Britain and the EU and has refused to divert British doses. to the bloc to cover the deficit on the continent.
The EU says it has allowed the export of millions of doses of Pfizer vaccines, which are not made by Britain. On Tuesday, European Council President Charles Michel said that Britain, like the United States, had “completely banned” the export of vaccines produced on its territory.
London says there is no such ban and attributes the success of its vaccine program to strong negotiations last year with pharmaceutical companies and early investment in supply chains.
EU officials claim that London has in effect prevented AstraZeneca’s vaccine exports by invoking a clause in its contract that requires the company to fulfill Britain’s request first.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson told Parliament that he had to “correct” Michel’s claim. The government, he said, “has not blocked the export of any COVID-19 vaccine or its components.”
The Foreign Ministry said it had convened the EU Charge d’Affaires Nicole Mannion “to discuss the issue of incorrect claims in recent EU communications.”
When asked if Britain was using its contract with AstraZeneca to effectively block exports, a Johnson spokesperson said: “The movement of vaccines and their components to and from the UK is governed by the contractual obligations that vaccine suppliers they have with their customers. “
Initially claiming that Britain had imposed a “rampant” ban on exports, Michel later said that there were “different ways of imposing bans or restrictions on vaccines.”
An EU official said the bloc had allowed the export of 8 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to Britain since January 30, and many more before.
Manfred Weber, head of the largest political group in the European Parliament, told the British chancellor to “stop giving lessons and show the data on British exports.”
The dispute over vaccines comes at a time when the bloc and its former member are also fighting over Brexit. An EU diplomat said such verbal disputes were “the new normal.”
“With more economic divergences and more competition ahead, the pressure on our Brexit agreements will only grow,” said the diplomat.
Last week, Britain unilaterally extended a grace period on controls on food arriving in Northern Ireland from other parts of the UK, required by its Brexit deal. The move is expected to elicit a legal response from Brussels this week, two Brussels diplomatic sources said.
“This has been another provocation. It is not the first and no one expects it to be the last. The EU will remain calm and react firmly,” said a second senior EU diplomat.
(Information from Philip Blenkinsop, Gabriela Baczynska, Francesco Guarascio; edited by Alex Richardson; translated by Tomás Cobos; Edited in Spanish by Javier López de Lérida)
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