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* EU reverses plan to trigger Brexit clauses
* EU tried to restrict vaccine exports to UK
* UK seeks urgent answers, expresses concern
* Irish PM expresses concerns to EU chief
(Adds reaction from Ireland)
By Andy Bruce, Kate Holton and Marine Strauss
LONDON/BRUSSELS, Jan 29 (Reuters) - The European Union on
Friday abruptly reversed a plan to use emergency Brexit measures
to restrict exports of COVID-19 vaccines from crossing the Irish
border into the United Kingdom after it sent shockwaves through
Northern Ireland, London and Dublin.
In a steep escalation of the EU's fight to secure vaccine
supplies, Brussels had said it would trigger clauses in the
Northern Irish Protocol to prevent the vaccines from moving
across the open border between EU-member Ireland and the
British-run province.
Following an outcry in London, Belfast and Dublin, the EU
published a statement just before midnight saying it would
ensure that the Northern Ireland Protocol, designed to keep the
border open, would not be affected.
It warned, however, that should vaccines and active
substances move toward third countries and out of the bloc, it
would use "all the instruments at its disposal".
Ireland said the EU's change of heart was welcome but that
lessons should be learned.
"The Protocol is not something to be tampered with lightly,
it's an essential, hard won compromise, protecting peace and
trade for many," Irish foreign affairs minister Simon Coveney
said on Twitter.
The EU's original plan was intended to prevent the open
border between EU-member Ireland and Northern Ireland from
acting as a backdoor for vaccine supplies into the United
Kingdom.
The public reversal followed a round of frantic calls as
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson told EU Commission
President Ursula von der Leyen of his "grave concerns" while
Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin spoke to both Johnson and
the EU chief to find a solution.
Northern Irish unionists cast the EU's original plan as an
act of hostility.
In a tweet late on Friday, von der Leyen said she had spoken
to Johnson: "We agreed on the principle that there should not be
restrictions on the export of vaccines by companies where they
are fulfilling contractual responsibilities."
STOKING TENSION
The swiftest mass vaccination drive in history is stoking
tensions across the world as big powers buy up doses in bulk and
poorer nations try to navigate a financial and diplomatic
minefield to collect whatever supplies are left.
The EU, whose member states are far behind Israel, Britain
and the United States in rolling out vaccines, is scrambling to
get supplies just as the West's biggest drugmakers slow
deliveries to the bloc because of production problems.
The British-Swedish drugmaker AstraZeneca has been
caught in the crosshairs after it said last week it would fall
short of delivering promised vaccines to the EU by March because
of production problems in Belgium.
That angered Brussels which has demanded to know why the
company cannot divert supplies from its British sites, which
have been producing millions of shots for British citizens.
Britain has its own domestic supply chain in place for
AstraZeneca, including rolling it out in Northern Ireland, but
it imports Pfizer's vaccine from a factory in Belgium.
The European Commission agreed to a broader plan to control
exports of vaccines from the bloc, including to Britain, arguing
it needed to do so to ensure its own supplies.
But the EU's abortive attempt to use the Northern Ireland
Protocol triggered anger in the province.
Northern Ireland First Minister Arlene Foster described it
as "an incredible act of hostility".
Preserving the delicate peace in Northern Ireland without
allowing the United Kingdom a back door into the EU's markets
through the UK-Irish 310-mile land border was one of the most
difficult issues of the Brexit divorce talks.
(Reporting by Kate Holton, Andy Bruce and William James;
Editing by Guy Faulconbridge, Daniel Wallis, Aurora Ellis and
Grant McCool)
