BRUSSELS – The European Union at the beginning of Saturday abruptly reversed an attempt to restrict bloc vaccine exports to Britain via Northern Ireland, the latest misstep in the faltering launch of the vaccine on the continent.
The bloc received harsh criticism on Friday from Britain, Ireland and the World Health Organization, when it announced plans to use emergency measures under the Brexit agreement to prevent Covid-19 vaccines from being sent across the Irish border into Britain. -Brittany.
The reversal came when the European Commission and its president, Ursula von der Leyen, were already under pressure for the relatively slow implementation of vaccines in the 27 member states, especially in comparison with Britain and the United States.
The Commission announced the restrictions without consulting member states or Britain, a former member – exceptionally aggressive behavior that is not typical of the bloc, said Mujtaba Rahman, the head of Europe for the Eurasia Group, a political risk consultancy .
“There is clearly panic at the highest levels of the Commission, and the question of the Northern Ireland agreement has been swept up in this larger issue of the poor performance of the EU vaccine,” he said.
The drama unfolded at a time when the bloc’s plan to vaccinate 70% of its adult population by the summer was falling apart. Already slow in ordering and delivering vaccines, the European Union was hit by a devastating blow when AstraZeneca announced that it would reduce vaccine deliveries due to production problems.
The EU’s initial plan to limit vaccine exports to countries outside the EU brought screams of outrage from both the Republic of Ireland, a member of the European Union, and Northern Ireland, a part of the United Kingdom. Both sides are committed to not re-creating any land borders between the two parts of the island of Ireland.
The triggering of emergency measures in the Brexit agreement shortly after Britain left the bloc’s authority in late 2020 seemed to question the European Union’s sincerity in following the agreement with Ireland – which was one of the biggest obstacles to reaching the agreement. . The Prime Minister of Ireland, Micheal Martin, immediately raised the issue with von der Leyen.
Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson spoke to both leaders. And Arlene Foster, the prime minister of Northern Ireland, called the bloc’s decision “an incredible act of hostility”.
The Britons who defended Brexit point to the faster implementation of vaccination in their country as a benefit of slowing down the bloc and its collective processes.
Tom Tugendhat, a conservative member of the British Parliament who initially opposed Brexit, but reluctantly voted in favor of the deal, said on Twitter that the signs of the vaccine dispute were cause for concern.
“Whatever your opinion of Brexit, it is now completely clear how we are seen by the EU – we are out,” he said, and “goodwill is economic.” He called for a policy that “rebuilds relationships”.
Mrs Von der Leyen and the Commission were quick to step back, insisting that a mistake had been made and that any vaccine export controls would ensure that the Brexit agreement, which gave guarantees that there would be no new border controls between Ireland and Northern Ireland would be “unaffected”. That protocol essentially treats Northern Ireland as part of the European Union’s regulatory space.
But it was clear that the move to introduce export controls was aimed at preventing any dose of vaccine produced in the European Union from being sent to Britain across the open border on the island of Ireland.
The British considered this an aggressive act. Mr. Johnson called Mrs. Von der Leyen and said afterwards that he had “expressed his grave concern about the potential impact”.
The World Health Organization has joined the criticisms of EU export controls, saying that such measures were at risk of prolonging the pandemic. Its director general, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said on Friday that “vaccine nationalism” could lead to a “prolonged recovery”. Mariangela Simão, deputy director-general for access to medicines, on Saturday classified the change as part of a “very worrying trend”.
After talking to Martin and Johnson and getting advice from the European Union ambassador in London, Ms. Von der Leyen posted a tweet after midnight saying that “we agree with the principle that there should be no restrictions on vaccine exports by companies where they are fulfilling contractual responsibilities. “
The bloc also intends to introduce export controls that prevent vaccines manufactured in the European Union from being sent to countries outside the EU, but without involving Northern Ireland, which in any case receives vaccines from Britain.
Earlier in the week, the Commission and Mrs Von der Leyen accused the Swedish-British company of failing to fulfill its contract. They suggested that AstraZeneca, which is working with a vaccine developed at the University of Oxford, was giving preferential treatment to Britain and even sending some vaccines made in the European Union there.
AstraZeneca contested the accusation and its executive director, Pascal Soriot, insisted that the contract with the European Union required only “best reasonable efforts” to meet delivery schedules.
Britain signed its own contract with the company three months before the European Union, Soriot said, and under that contract, vaccines produced in Britain must arrive first.
The lawyers disagreed about the language of the EU contract, which was only partially made public.
Ms. Von der Leyen, who had previously left most of the vaccine dispute to her commissioners, said on Thursday that the bloc would introduce a temporary export control mechanism to block vaccine exports made in the European Union – a measure clearly aimed at AstraZeneca, which also manufactures in Belgium.
The approval to use even the AstraZeneca vaccine in the European Union came only on Friday. Therefore, the company could hardly be held responsible for the deficiencies in vaccinations resulting from previous Commission decisions to place large orders for the entire bloc, which reduced the price of vaccines, but delayed orders and deliveries.
Nor did it help the bloc’s unit when the German government and then-President Emmanuel Macron of France first cast doubt on whether the AstraZeneca vaccine was effective for people over 65 – contradicting what the European Medicines Agency said when it approved the vaccine for all adults.
For the German magazine Der Spiegel, who is not a fan of von der Leyen, the incorrect handling of the vaccine launch is her responsibility. “Europe is facing a vaccine disaster,” wrote the magazine, which “could turn out to be the biggest disaster of its entire political career.”