- The EU’s vaccination is going so badly that China and Russia are now selling their own supplies to Europe.
- China and Russia use the contracts as leverage to extract concessions from Europe.
- The development has major implications for relations between the powers and the West.
- Visit the Insider Business Department for more stories.
The implementation of the EU vaccination is going so badly that China and Russia now want to contribute to compensating for the difference, with major consequences for relations between the two powers, Europe and the USA.
“In both cases, there is a geopolitical agenda,” Dalibor Roháč, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, said in an interview with Insider this week.
‘If Chinese and Russian vaccines are effective, it can help [European] “countries are coming out of the pandemic sooner than their neighbors, China and Russia, have bought for themselves a whole lot of goodwill in the region – at the expense of Brussels and Washington – that they can gain at a time of their choice,” he said.
EU vaccination program fails
The European Commission has come under intense criticism in recent weeks over the slow progress of its vaccination effort, coordinated centrally from Brussels to prevent smaller states from lagging behind.
China and Russia will have bought a whole lot of goodwill in the region at the expense of Brussels and Washington
A number of factors, including declining inventories, production problems and a dramatic duel with the drug firm AstraZeneca, mean that the EU has received far fewer vaccines than it has ordered, prompting Germany’s finance minister to to give total shitshow ”. Russia and China are more than happy to try to fill the gap.
Hungary was the first European member state to lose patience with Brussels and follow its own path with vaccines. After Viktor Orban, his Euroseptic prime minister, said, “I’m not waiting,” he ordered 5 million doses of China-state-sponsored Sinopharm vaccine and 2 million doses of Russian Sputnik V vaccine, quickly approved its approval, and began administering both sites. in February.
Implementation of vaccination program in Europe was disgraceful
Other European countries, including Poland, Austria, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, have now also begun to monitor Russian or Chinese vaccines, Politico reported, despite the fact that none was approved for use by the EU’s Medicines Agency. .
The move will inevitably undermine the EU’s approach to obtaining vaccines, but for the countries the calculation is simple.
“Politics for these smaller countries really need their economies. It’s hard to say no,” said Theresa Fallon, director of the Center for Russia Europe Asia Studies (CREAS) in Brussels, in an interview with Insider.
“Everyone is struggling to get a vaccine, and if there’s an effective one that they can not get their hands on for a lot of money, they will take it. I do not think they will think twice about it. the vaccination program in Europe was shambolic. ‘
Russia and China use Europe’s failure to their advantage
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Whether Russia and China will be able to keep their vaccine promises remains an open question, Fallon said.
Data published by the health magazine Lancet indicated that the Sputnik V-jab was very effective in preventing COVID-19, but Russia has not yet vaccinated much of its own population, and it is speculated that it is struggling with production. of vaccines – although an agreement has been reached in Italy, this situation will produce 10 million stab wounds from July.
Meanwhile, China’s vaccines are already being delivered worldwide, but Beijing has refused to publish comprehensive safety data for the Sinovac and Sinopharm jabs. Fallon also said that fake vaccines containing mineral water and saline sent abroad from China could undermine confidence in their efforts to distribute vaccines to other countries.
If Russia and China can keep their vaccine promises, it’s much more than a good link for both regimes. It can also provide geopolitical leverage, making it harder for countries to impose sanctions and easier to ignore bad behavior.
‘China use [its vaccines] not just to win hearts and minds. It’s clearly very transactional, ” said Theresa Fallon.
Beijing has already shown its readiness to use its vaccine as a tool for political gain, and has reportedly delayed a shipment of its Sinovac sting to Turkey because it has reached an agreement with the Turkish government on the extradition of Uighur Muslims wanted to withdraw.
Both regimes want to withdraw concessions later
“Both regimes want to withdraw concessions later,” Dalibor Roháč said.
“It will be more difficult to make the argument for imposing further sanctions on Russia when Putin decides to cause problems in the region if a number of member states owe Moscow debt for reversing the pandemic.
“Similarly, it will be more difficult to voice the case even for a partial decoupling with China if Chinese vaccines play a role in the recovery.”