Brussels chief accused of ‘outrageous’ UK vaccine slur to cover-up EU’s own failures

PMQs: Boris Johnson rejects EU’s claim about vaccine exports

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Backbencher Andrew Bridgen accused Brussels of attempting to smear Britain to cover-up its own jabs failure. It comes after Brussels chief Charles Michel’s incorrect claim that the UK has an “outright ban” on Covid jabs being shipped abroad. Mr Bridgen fumed: “This is the EU cynically trying to deflect onto us what they’re actually doing themselves.

“They’re trying to excuse their own woeful performance to their citizens by attempting to smear the UK.”

He added: “It actually reinforces how vulnerable they are by the fact they’re having to make up such outrageous lies to deflect criticism of how they’ve handled the vaccine procurement and rollout.”

Prime Minister Boris Johnson also condemned the outrageous attempts from Brussels to discredit Britain’s roaring vaccines success.

But European Council President Mr Michel was still refusing to apologise for the misleading slur even though officials close to him conceded their boss had got it horribly wrong.

And it came as Brussels threatened a blanket ban on all pharmaceutical firms wanting to send their vaccines outside of the bloc.

Top EU official, Mr Michel sparked fury in Whitehall on Tuesday night after he accused the Government of “vaccine nationalism” with an “outright ban on the export of vaccines”.

The Belgian’s outrageous slur added further tension to the UK’s already fractious post-Brexit relationship with the bloc.

Responding to the allegations, Mr Johnson insisted Britons should be proud of their country’s vaccine heroics at home and abroad.

Speaking in the Commons, the Prime Minister said: “The whole House can be proud of the UK’s vaccination programme with over 22.5 million people having received their first dose across the UK.

“We can also be proud of the support the UK has given to the international Covid response, including the £548 million we’ve donated to COVAX.”

He added: “I therefore wish to correct the suggestion from the European Council President that the UK has blocked vaccine exports. Let me be clear, we have not blocked the export of a single COVID-19 vaccine or vaccine components.

“This pandemic has put us all on the same side in the battle for global health. We oppose vaccine nationalism in all its forms. I trust that all sides of the House in rejecting this suggestion and calling on all our partners to work together to tackle this pandemic.”

Downing Street aides said Mr Johnson felt compelled to reject false claims made by the EU about Britain’s vaccine programme.

The PM’s official spokesman added: “The simple fact is we haven’t got an export ban on any COVID-19 vaccine or any vaccine part.”

Mr Michel made the remarks in a desperate defence of the EU’s own export ban, which recently blocked a shipment of 250,000 life-saving jabs from Italy to Australia.

But he refused to back down in the bitter dispute even after a furious Dominic Raab summoned one of the bloc’s most senior diplomats in London to the Foreign Office to discuss the row.

Frustrated Whitehall officials say Brussels has repeatedly ignored their private attempts to set the record straight over vaccine exports.

One said: “There is frustration that we have made clear a number of times in private that this is not true and yet it keeps being said. This was really the last straw.”

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has also made the same claim in recent weeks.

A Foreign Office spokesman said: “A senior representative of the EU’s delegation to the UK was summoned to a meeting with Permanent Under-Secretary of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development office to discuss the issue of incorrect assertions in recent EU communications.”

Such showdown talks are normally reserved for dressing down rogue diplomats from Beijing and Moscow.

A senior Government source told Express.co.uk that “no apology was forthcoming” from EU envoy Nicole Mannion during the talks.

In a furious letter to Mr Michel sent on Tuesday evening, the Foreign Secretary lashed out at the Council boss for making “completely false” allegations that Britain was blockading vaccine exports.

Mr Raab wrote: “The UK Government has not blocked the export of a single COVID-19 vaccine or vaccine components.

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“Any references to a UK export ban or any restrictions of vaccines are completely false.”

He added: “We are facing this pandemic together.”

Mr Michel doubled down on the claims to the fury of Downing Street.

The Council President tweeted: “Glad if the UK reaction leads to more transparency and increased exports, to the EU and other countries.

“Different ways of imposing bans or restrictions on vaccines/medicines.”

Eurocrats were forced to concede they’d got it wrong after Mr Raab asked them to “set the record straight”.

And they even suggested they were about to ramp up their own export ban to prevent any vaccines from leaving the bloc.

A source close to Mr Michel said: “He didn’t get it quite right.”

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The European Commission refused to apologise for the allegations against Britain, but admitted they were incorrect.

A spokesman said: “Different countries have got different measures in place. This does not concern vaccines, as far as we understand, coming from the UK.

“But we know as well that we, the EU, are a very very active exporter of vaccines and that this is not necessarily the case of all our partners.”

Brussels unveiled its so-called export transparency mechanism in late January after it complained that AstraZeneca was prioritising deliveries to the UK over member states.

It claimed the Anglo-Swedish firm’s contract with Britain, which gives the UK first refusal on any domestic-made jabs, is “tantamount to an export ban”.

Under the EU’s export ban, pharmaceutical giants must apply before sending vaccines abroad.

Eurocrats have already used the measure, due to expire at the end of the month, to confiscate a shipment of 250,000 AstraZeneca jabs from Italy to Australia.

Asked whether the draconian measure could be ramped up further, a spokesman said: “You’ll have to wait and see what the Commission decides.

“The current mechanism expires at the end of this month, and definitely all options are on the table.”

Mrs von der Leyen this week hinted that she would use the ban to specifically target exports of AstraZeneca’s jab.

Persistent political attacks on the Oxford-produced shot has seen European trust in it slump – further damaging the bloc’s already sluggish jabs programme.

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