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In a jab at Britain, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Thursday said she had “no knowledge” of the U.K. exporting any vaccines — and was “waiting for their transparency.”
Speaking at a press conference after a meeting of EU leaders, von der Leyen said she had not seen evidence showing any British-made vaccines had left the country, a sore subject given the EU-made doses going to the U.K.
Meanwhile, von der Leyen said, the EU is the biggest vaccine exporter in the world, having shipped a total of 77 million doses abroad since the start of December.
The barbed remarks jarred with the tone the Commission took on Wednesday, when it issued a joint statement with the U.K. which pledged that the two sides would work together on a “win-win situation” to resolve the current disagreement over the EU’s moves to restrict vaccine deliveries.
Von der Leyen even touted the bloc’s vaccine export mechanisms during Thursday night’s press conference, calling them a necessary step that had shed light on the imbalance of vaccine shipments. The mechanism has sparked considerable anger in the U.K., which argues it signed simply stronger contracts with vaccine makers.
“I think that it was good to introduce the export authorization mechanism, indeed, to create transparency,” von der Leyen said. “Because that proves that the European Union is the most open reliably exporting region in the world.”
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