Iranian Supreme Leader announces ban on Covid-19 vaccines from US, UK

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Friday described coronavirus vaccines produced by the US and the UK as "completely untrustworthy" and prohibited their import in the country.

"Importing vaccines made in the US or the UK is prohibited. They're completely untrustworthy. It's not unlikely they would want to contaminate other nations. Given our experience with France's HIV-tainted blood supplies, French vaccines aren't trustworthy either," Khamenei wrote in a tweet on Friday.

Importing vaccines made in the US or the UK is prohibited. They're completely untrustworthy. It's not unlikely they would want to contaminate other nations. Given our experience with France's HIV-tainted blood supplies, French vaccines aren't trustworthy either.

In a televised speech, he also said that Washington and Britain are two worst-hit nations and therefore he has no confidence in the vaccines manufactured by these nations.

"If the Americans had managed to manufacture a vaccine, this coronavirus fiasco wouldn't have happened in their own country,” Rouhani was quoted as saying in the speech by Al Jazeera.

Iran is the worst-affected hit country by the pandemic in the Middle East and the first cases emerged in February 2020.  Earlier, Iran accused its arch-rival US of blocking its access to vaccines by enforcing tough sanctions regime.

Even though food and medicine are exempt from these sanctions, international banks tend to decline transactions that involve Iran. Iranian President has said Washington had asked Tehran to pay for the drugs via US banks and said he feared the United States would seize the money.

Late in December, Iran announced the first phase of a clinical trial of an indigenous vaccine. Tehran is also working to get 16.8 million doses of vaccines from COVAX, a global effort to provide vaccines by the World Health Organization.

Ref: wionews