European Union

France has started producing the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna Coronavirus vaccines to increase production in the European Union. Drug manufacturer Delpharm is producing the Pfizer/BioNTech in its plant in Saint-Rémy-sur-Avre. CDMO Recipharm is producing the Moderna vaccine in its facility in the Loire Valley.

Ursula von der Leyen's Deputy Commission Head Frans Timmermans has stated that "It is true that mistakes were made in ordering the vaccines both in Brussels and in the member states,". He added that he is "ready to take stock at the end of the pandemic. Then we can see what we did wrong and what we did right."

In the current situation, however, the first priority is "to ensure that all of Europe receives vaccine," Timmermans continued. He defended the joint procurement, saying that a European approach was "also in the interest of the richer countries" such as Germany.

Austria's Chancellor Sebastian Kurz has sharply criticized the distribution of vaccines against the coronavirus in the European Union. The distribution of the medicines among the EU member states is unfair, contrary to the declared objective of fair participation, he said. Since there were striking differences in the progress of vaccination between the member states, he and other heads of government had compared the national supply data. The result was that deliveries were not made according to population keys: Deliveries were not being made according to population keys. "When I shared this information with some heads of state and government yesterday, many could not believe their eyes and ears," Kurz said.

The Swedish-British vaccine manufacturer AstraZeneca has again revised the announced delivery quantity downwards. According to this, the member states of the European Union will probably only receive 30 million doses of Corona vaccine by the end of the month - ten million less than last announced. This was already a reduced quantity: originally, AstraZeneca had contractually promised to deliver 90 million doses.

Poland is taking the new rule of law clause in the EU budget to the European Court of Justice. This was announced by the government in Warsaw on Thursday. The EU's top judges are to examine whether the new mechanism for cutting EU funds in the event of certain rule of law violations is permissible.

Hungary and Poland oppose the new rule of law mechanism in the EU's multi-annual financial framework for 2021 to 2027. They fear that the mechanism is aimed at cutting EU funds to them because of controversial political projects. Both countries receive billions of euros net from the EU budget. At the same time, both countries are subject to legal proceedings under Article 7 of the EU Treaties for alleged disregard of fundamental EU values.

The European Medicines Agency has announced, that their human medicines committee (CHMP) concluded by consensus that the data on the Covid-19 vaccine Janssen were robust and met the criteria for efficacy, safety and quality.

"With this latest positive opinion, authorities across the European Union will have another option to combat the pandemic and protect the lives and health of their citizens," said Emer Cooke, EMA's Executive Director, adding, "this is the first vaccine which can be used as a single dose". These measures will allow regulators to swiftly assess data emerging from a range of different sources and take any necessary regulatory action to protect public health.

The former regional president of Catalonia, Carles Puigdemont, loses his immunity as an MEP. The European Parliament voted on Monday evening to withdraw the right of protection, as has now been announced. Two of Puigdemont's comrades-in-arms in the fight for Catalonia's independence from Spain are also affected. The Catalans now face extradition to the Spanish authorities.

An official of the European Medicines Agency (EMA) is cautioning the European Union to hold back on granting emergency authorization for Sputnik V, Russia's Covid-19 vaccine until its effectiveness has been reviewed.

“We need documents that we can review. We also don’t at the moment have data...about vaccinated people. It is unknown. That’s why I would urgently advise against giving a national emergency authorization,” EMA managing board head Christa Wirthumer-Hoche said. “We can have Sputnik V on the market here in future when the appropriate data have been reviewed. The rolling review has begun now at EMA.”

Hungary's head of government withdraws his Fidesz MEPs from the EPP group in the EU Parliament.

The Hungarian right-wing nationalist ruling party Fidesz will leave the Christian Democratic EPP group in the European Parliament today, Wednesday. This was announced by Fidesz this morning. The withdrawal had already been announced by Prime Minister Viktor Orban in a letter to EPP Group leader Manfred Weber.

In it, Orban had threatened the parliamentary group, which wants to suspend the Fidesz deputies. If it came to the vote and adoption of new rules of procedure of the group, which makes the suspension or the exclusion of whole groups possible, the Fidesz MEPs would leave the club of the European People's Party of their own accord, Orban had announced.

The European Commission plans to propose a draft for an EU-wide digital vaccination passport – the Digital Green Pass – on March 17, Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said Monday. The digital passport should provide information regarding vaccination status, test results, and prior Covid-19 recoveries.

"As for the question of what the digital green passport could look like: we will submit a legislative proposal in March," so von der Leyen.

Twenty-seven European leaders have met to debate joint Covid-19 measures, including unilateral border and movement restrictions, the slow vaccine rollout and vaccine passports. While open questions remain, a vaccine passport is to be expected by summer.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel expects that the EU vaccination passport can be developed by the summer. "The political target is to achieve this in the next few months, I have spoken of three months," the CDU politician said on Thursday after the EU video summit.

The certificate is intended to create the possibility of granting advantages to vaccinated persons, if necessary. "Everyone has pointed out today that this is not an issue at all at the moment, given the low vaccination coverage of the population. But one has to prepare oneself," Merkel emphasized. She added that the vaccination certificate alone would not determine who could travel. "No political decisions have been made about this at all yet."

On Monday, BioNTech and Pfizer said they would increase their Covid-19 vaccine delivery the European Union in the second quarter of 2021, pledging an additional 75 million doses. Both BioNTech-Pfizer and AstraZeneca have recently experienced production delays, resulting in slower vaccine distribution schedules in the EU.

The state-owned Direct Investment Fund, which co-finances the vaccine and markets it abroad, announced in Moscow on Friday that Russia wants to help out the European Union with its vaccine. In the second quarter, 100 million doses of the vaccine Sputnik V could be delivered, which would allow 50 million people to be vaccinated. The prerequisite is that the European Medicines Agency (EMA) approves the active ingredient.

Independent studies testing the efficiency of the vaccine are outstanding.

Following the renewed request from the European Commission on 27 January 2021, pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca has agreed to the publication of its partially redacted contract with the EU. Redactions were made mainly in those places where it concerns deadlines for promised deliveries and their scope.

Following the surprise announcement that it would deliver only 31 million units by the end of March instead of the agreed minimum of 80 million, Astra Zeneca promised 39 million doses earlier this week. However, the EU had judged this offer to be insufficient as the vaccine delivery was still fifty percent below the originally agreed figure.

On Friday, the European Commission is set to decide on a "transparency and authorization mechanism for the export of vaccines" from the EU after vaccine manufacturers had to reduce vaccine supply for EU countries.

"Any exporting company would send into the national authorities their plan what to export, when, to whom and so on, and what amount, and the national authorities will then be allowed to check that and to give an authorization or a refusal. That, of course, has to happen very quickly, so it's a question not of weeks, but the question of hours." one EU official said.

Another official told reporters that the EU is "not proposing to impose an export ban" but rather plans to "monitor how the funds that we paid from the EU budget have been used and how the advanced purchase agreements that we concluded with pharmaceutical companies are producing vaccines for our citizens."

The EU Commission considers a uniform upper limit for cash payments to be sensible. Currently, 10,000 euros is considered the likely maximum amount.

To make it more difficult for criminals to handle cash, the group would prefer to introduce an EU-wide cap on cash payments of a maximum of 10,000 euros, although individual member states could also introduce lower limits.

The EU Commission is threatening pharmaceutical companies with a ban on exports of Covid-19 vaccines to countries outside the EU. This is the Brussels-based authority's reaction to the surprising announcement by AstraZeneca that it will initially supply significantly less vaccine than contractually agreed.

The EU Commission is demanding insight into the data of the pharmaceutical company Astrazeneca. "The EU is demanding information from the company by Jan. 29 at the latest on why it wants to supply fewer vaccine doses to the EU," EU Commission circles said Monday evening after another meeting of company representatives with members of the EU states. There was not enough clarity and explanation from Astrazenecas, EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides said on Twitter.

The rescue ship "Ocean Viking" is allowed to bring more than 370 boat migrants rescued from distress at sea to Augusta in Sicily. This was announced by the operator organization SOS Mediterranee on Sunday evening. Italy had assigned the crew the port near Syracuse. A heavily pregnant woman had reportedly been flown to the island of Lampedusa earlier by Italian authorities.

After that, there were still 373 people on board who had been rescued by four inflatable boats off Libya in recent days, he said. The crew had appealed to Malta and Italy to take them in. The arrival is expected for Monday.

The EU Commission has concluded a contract for up to 300 million more doses of the Corona vaccine from the Mainz-based company BioNtech and its US partner Pfizer. 75 million doses of this should be available as early as the second quarter of 2021, EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said in Brussels on Friday.

Back in November, the EU Commission ordered up to 300 million doses of vaccine from BioNtech/Pfizer for all 27 states - a firm order for 200 million doses and an option for 100 million more, which was recently pulled.

In Germany, BioNtech is currently working on a new production site in Marburg. If this goes into operation in February as planned, the company will be able to massively expand vaccine production.

BioNTech is working flat out with partner Pfizer to boost production of their Covid-19 vaccine, its founders said, warning there would be gaps in supply until other vaccines were rolled out. The German biotech start-up has led the vaccine race but its shot has been slow to arrive in the EU due to relatively slow approval from the bloc’s health regulator and the small size of the order placed by Brussels.

The delays have caused consternation in Germany, where some regions had to temporarily close vaccination centres days after the launch of an inoculation drive on December 27th.

The president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen has announced via Twitter that the European Medicines Agency has "just issued a positive scientific opinion on the #BioNTech / @pfizer vaccine". She now expects that the European Commission will decide "by this evening" if the vaccine will be permitted.

The European Parliament has given the negotiations on a possible trade pact with Great Britain until Sunday. With just two weeks to go before the end of the Brexit transition period on 31 December, the European Union is still negotiating a follow-up deal with Britain that would avoid tariffs and serious trade barriers. However, according to British government sources, the negotiating parties are still very far apart on key issues.

The European Parliament has given the negotiations on a possible trade pact with Great Britain until Sunday. If a finished text is available by midnight, it is prepared to schedule a special session for ratification, according to a decision by the parliament's leadership.

After the European Medicines Agency (EMA) announced it would issue its decision on the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine on December 21, German Health Minister Jens Spahn, speaking at a joint press conference with the Robert Koch Institute, the government agency responsible for disease control and prevention, said the report was "good news."

A fortnight ago, BioNTech and Pfizer submitted an application to the EMA for conditional marketing authorization for their COVID-19 vaccine. President of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen tweeted that she welcomed the EMA's decision to bring the meeting forward.

In a joint statement, the United Kingdom Prime Minister Boris Johnson and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said it was "responsible at this point to go the extra mile" and extend Brexit trade talks beyond a self-imposed deadline.

"We had a useful call with Boris Johnson this morning. We agreed that talks will continue," announced von der Leyen earlier Sunday.

The talks were initially extended until Sunday after Wednesday's meeting between von der Leyen and the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, billed as a "last-ditch effort," ended without an agreement.

Earlier this week, a joint statement by Johnson and von der Leyen cited three "critical" sticking points: fishing rights, the UK's ability to diverge on EU standards, and legal oversight of any deal.

European leaders agreed to increase the bloc's emission-reduction target to 55 percent by 203 following night-long discussions at their two-day summit in Brussels. The coal-reliant countries Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic are finally supporting the goal after member states agreed that the new target should be delivered collectively.

Three days before the decisive meeting of the heads of state and government, the other 25 EU states are now giving Hungary and Poland an ultimatum: either they drop their veto against the next seven-year EU budget, or the other 25 countries will remove the Covid-19 recovery package from the budget and re-issue it among themselves.

Germany joins Italy and France in their demand to ban ski resorts from opening until January 10, stating it would be a "great risk, even crazy, to open ski-slopes."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and multiple prime ministers addressed an appeal to all citizens to refrain from "all not absolutely necessary professional and private journeys, in particular, tourist journeys to foreign countries, especially considering the start of the ski season."

"The Federal Government is asked to come to coordinated regulations at European level in order to prevent ski tourism from being permitted before 10 January", the paper continues.

EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides opposes a Europe-wide ski ban over the Christmas holidays, saying that "there is no formula that applies to all EU countries because every country has a different situation."

The European Union faces a crisis after Hungary and Poland vetoed the bloc's historic €1.8tn budget and coronavirus recovery plan over attempts to link funding to respect for democratic norms.

The move unravels months of negotiations over the scale and terms of the EU's spending and sets the stage for a stormy videoconference meeting of the bloc's leaders on Thursday. The 27 EU heads of state and government had signed off on the broad spending package and the inclusion of a link to respect for the rule of law in July, after days of hard debate.