News Analysis India

Tag: British envoy

  • British envoy says travel restrictions row happened due to ‘transition’ in UK policy

    By PTI

    NEW DELHI: Days after the resolution of the UK-India travel restrictions row, British High Commissioner to India Alex Ellis on Thursday rejected claims that there was any racism angle to it and asserted that it happened due to the “transition” in the UK travel policy.

    He also said that the centre of the world is coming to India and the Euro-centric world is coming to an end.

    Speaking at the Times Now Summit, he said the AUKUS (Australia-UK-US) alliance, a trilateral security partnership, signifies Britain’s commitment to the Indo-Pacific Region and to keep it open and secure.

    On whether AUKUS complements the Quad, the British envoy called it another addition to the global patchwork of institutions.

    The Quad is a grouping comprising the US, India, Japan and Australia.

    The AUKUS should compliment the Quad, Ellis added.

    Asked about the British seemingly taking a skeptical view of India’s vaccination programme, he said, “I completely reject it.”

    “India’s vaccine programme is absolutely fantastic. Now about over a billion vaccines delivered, that is an astonishing achievement,” he asserted and pointed out that 80 per cent of those vaccines are the result of the UK-India cooperation — Covishield.

    “Worth remembering the story of Covishield — British government funded, researched by one of the greatest universities of the world at Oxford. The absolute quality of the people at Oxford that they went to the people of a commercial firm and said that if we are going to produce a vaccine, it has to be done at cost not profit, a rare thing to do. More impressively, the company, AstraZeneca, says we agree,” he said.

    Putting an end to the vaccine certification row, the UK on October 7 announced that Indians, fully vaccinated with Covishield vaccine, will no longer require to undergo quarantine on their arrival in Britain from October 11.

    On the row over the recognition of Covishield, Ellis said the UK did recognize the vaccine and made it “abundantly clear”.

    “What is happening that all countries, including India, are making a transition in their rules for travel.

    Travel in the pandemic is a complicated thing as we have all learnt.

    We (the UK) were shifting from a rule based on which country you are coming from to what you have been double jabbed with,” he said, explaining the reasons that led to the row.

    Asked about what he would say to those calling the British action racist and patronizing, Ellis’s said, “That it isn’t and it never was.

    ” He went on to name Indian-origin British ministers such as Rishi Sunak and Priti Patel to underline that “India is creating an enormous success story in the UK”.

    Describing the vaccine certification row as a “ruffle”, he said it was mainly the result of a transition in travel policy which India then reciprocated.

    “We recognized Covishield, we are recognizing Covaxin for the purpose of people coming into the country.

    We would now like to end restraints on travel which limit the number of flights between UK and India which we would like to increase, we want to enable British citizens to join the citizens of every other country in the world in getting e-visas as that will attract tourist and investment into India,” the British envoy here said.

    On whether the matter could have been handled better, he said everything can be handled better and added that “we should have been clearer at the start that Covishield was recognized” as part of the various Astrazeneca vaccines around the world.

    “If we would have said that on the day of the start of the change in policy, people here would have understood,” he said.

    The UK recognised Covishield vaccine produced by the Serum Institute of India but retained the 10-day quarantine period for fully vaccinated travellers from India.

    The move did not provide any relief from quarantine rules for Indian travellers vaccinated with two doses of Covishield.

    Later, British officials said the UK has issues with India’s vaccine certification process and not with the Covishield vaccine.

    However, the UK then decided to scrap tough COVID-19 quarantine travel rules for 47 destinations, including India.

    Following this, India also withdrew the reciprocal Covid checks and restrictions it had imposed on those arriving from the UK.

  • India, UK hold talks on vaccine certification process: British envoy

    By PTI

    NEW DELHI: British High Commissioner Alex Ellis on Thursday said India and the UK held “excellent” technical discussion on the issue of vaccine certification.

    Referring to new British travel rules, Ellis had on Wednesday said there was no problem with Covishield vaccine and that the main issue is COVID-19 vaccine certification done through the CoWIN app.

    “Excellent technical discussions with @rssharma3 @AyushmanNHA. Neither side raised technical concerns with each other’s certification process. An important step forward in our joint aim to facilitate travel and fully protect public health of UK and India,” he tweeted on Thursday.

    Following India’s strong criticism over the UK’s refusal to recognise Covishield, London on Wednesday amended its new guidelines to include the Indian-made version of the AstraZeneca vaccine in its updated international travel advisory.

    However, Indian travellers vaccinated with two doses of Covishield will still have to undergo 10 days of quarantine in the UK notwithstanding the amendment, UK officials clarified on Wednesday saying the inclusion of the vaccine will not make much of a difference.

    “We’re clear Covishield is not a problem. The UK is open to travel and we’re already seeing a lot of people going from India to the UK, be it tourists, business people or students,” Ellis said in a statement on Wednesday.

    “We have been having detailed technical discussions regarding certification, with the builders of the CoWIN app and the NHS app, about both apps.

    They’re happening at a rapid pace, to ensure that both countries mutually recognise the vaccine certificates issued by each other,” he said.

    According to new rules, Indian travellers who received both doses of the Covishield vaccine produced by the Serum Institute of India will be considered unvaccinated and will have to undergo self-isolation for 10 days.

    In a strong reaction, India had on Tuesday warned of “reciprocal measures” if the UK does not address its concerns over the new travel rules relating to COVID-19 vaccine certification with Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla describing these norms as “discriminatory”.

    Referring to the latest guidelines issued by the UK government that will come into effect on October 4, another UK officials had said that London does not have any problem with the Covishield vaccine but there are certain issues related to vaccine certification in India.

    The new British rules have triggered massive criticism in India.

    External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar also took up the issue of Covishield-vaccinated travellers being required to quarantine in the UK with newly-appointed British Foreign Secretary Elizabeth Truss at a meeting in New York on Tuesday.