The European Commission says it has already authorized a vaccine delivery to Canada and will apply COVID-19 vaccine export control restrictions only in "very limited cases."
In a statement to CBC News, a Commission spokesperson said there have been only two requests for delivery, one from Canada and another from the UK.
"Member states have handled these requests very swiftly and these exports have been authorized in accordance with the opinion of the Commission. It proves that the system is working and that we will use it only in very limited cases," the statement said.
Canada is aware that the EU has the duty to ensure that its citizens are vaccinated as soon as possible, the statement said, yet it does not want to deprive other countries from their own much needed vaccines, especially those that don't have their own manufacturing capacity.
The statement explained that the aim is to get transparency and keep restrictions to an absolute minimum.
The statement confirms assurances that Public Services and Procurement Minister Anita Anand gave at a COVID-19 update earlier Tuesday in which she said Canada would be getting its expected vaccine shipments from Europe this week.
"We have had conversations with our suppliers as recently as this morning and yesterday, who have assured us that the paperwork has been submitted, and that the shipments should be fine, for this week to leave the European Union," Anand said. "We are expecting our shipments as a result, and all systems are a go for these shipments."
Anand's office confirmed to CBC that vaccine deliveries have already begun to arrive in Canada.
On Monday, Minister of International Trade Mary Ng said she and the prime minister had received a number of verbal assurances from European officials that Canada's vaccine orders would not be affected by the controls. Opposition MPs said the government should have sought written guarantees to that effect.
On Tuesday morning, Prime Minister Trudeau echoed Ng's statements.
"The conversations I had with the president of the European Commission were enough to reassure me, and should be enough to reassure all Canadians, that the European Union is extremely mindful that Canada's contracts be respected, and that our supply of vaccines not be interfered with," Trudeau said at his morning press conference.
He added that in his phone conversation with European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, she told him that the export controls were a transparency measure.
According to the European Commission website, "The objective of this measure is to ensure timely access to COVID-19 vaccines for all EU citizens and to tackle the current lack of transparency of vaccine exports outside the EU."
Great news, and good decision by the EU. We may not need to use that leverage list at all.
