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(Adds British government reaction)
By John Chalmers
BRUSSELS, March 9 (Reuters) - European Council President
Charles Michel on Tuesday rejected charges of "vaccine
nationalism" levelled against the EU, saying that while Britain
and the United States have outright bans on exports of COVID-19
shots, the EU had not stopped exporting.
The EU has found itself under fire at home for a vaccine
roll-out much slower than those of former member Britain or the
United States, and abroad for so far doing less than China,
Russia or India to supply vaccines to poor countries.
Last week it annoyed vaccine buyers abroad by endorsing an
Italian decision to halt a shipment to Australia.
Britain had a quick retort for the comments by Michel, who
represents the 27 European Union member states, saying it has
not blocked the export of a single COVID-19 vaccine.
"Any references to a UK export ban or any restrictions on
vaccines are completely false," a UK government spokesman said.
In a lengthy statement Michel laid out a defence of the
bloc's strategy. He said that without Europe, it would not have
been possible to develop and produce several vaccines in less
than a year, and EU solidarity had ensured that poorer countries
of the bloc received their first doses.
He took aim at the "highly publicised" supply of vaccines by
China and Russia to other countries.
"We should not let ourselves be misled by China and Russia,
both regimes with less desirable values than ours, as they
organise highly limited but widely publicised operations to
supply vaccines to others." Michel also noted that China and
Russia had both vaccinated fewer people at home than the EU.
"Europe will not use vaccines for propaganda purposes. We
promote our values," he said.
Michel also defended a system to control the export of doses
produced in EU countries, invoked by Italy last week to block a
shipment of AstraZeneca shots to Australia.
"Our objective: to prevent companies from which we have
ordered and pre-financed doses from exporting them to other
advanced countries when they have not delivered to us what was
promised," Michel said. "The EU has never stopped exporting."
He said the EU would become the world's leading vaccine
producer in the coming months and was the best equipped to adapt
vaccine output quickly to virus mutations.
The British government's rebuff of Michel's comments came at
a time of growing tensions between London and Brussels following
the completion of Britain's exit from the EU at the end of 2020.
Relations strained by years of bruising talks over Brexit
took a turn for the worse in January when the EU briefly
threatened to use emergency measures to stop coronavirus
vaccines going from the bloc into Northern Ireland, a
British-ruled province bordering EU member state Ireland.
"This pandemic is a global challenge and international
collaboration on vaccine development continues to be an integral
part of our response," the British government spokesman said.
(Additional reporting by Elizabeth Piper and Costas Pitas in
London
Editing by Mark Heinrich)
