India says UK vaccine rule is ‘discriminatory’
NEW DELHI: India on Tuesday urged the UK to change a policy requiring visiting Indian nationals to quarantine even if they are fully vaccinated, describing it as “discriminatory”.
The issue was raised by external affairs minister S Jaishankar during a meeting with his British counterpart Liz Truss on the margins of the UN General Assembly in New York late on Monday.
The issue of vaccine certification has emerged as a fresh irritant in bilateral ties as Indian nationals who have received both doses of Covishield, the local variant of Britain’s Astrazeneca vaccine, will be considered as unvaccinated and will have to quarantine for 10 days under new British travel rules that will come into effect from October 4. Foreign secretary Harsh Shringla told a media briefing on Tuesday that India could consider imposing “reciprocal measures” against countries that don’t accept the country’s vaccine certification.
The basic issue, Shringla said, is that Covishield is a licensed product of a UK company that is manufactured in India, and five million doses of the vaccine have even been supplied to Britain at the request of the UK government, and used by the National Health Service.
“Therefore, non-recognition of Covishield is a discriminatory policy and does impact on those of our citizens travelling to the UK,” he said. “Urged early resolution of quarantine issue in mutual interest,” Jaishankar tweeted after his meeting with Truss. Shringla said the minister raised the issue “strongly” with Truss and was given certain assurances “that this issue would be resolved”.
The UK said on Monday it is working with India on the recognition of Covid-19 vaccine certification issued by Indian authorities following criticism of the new travel restrictions, suggesting that the recognition of the certificates themselves is an issue to be worked out.