KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 24 — Malaysia today received the second batch of 500,000 doses of Sinopharm Covid-19 vaccine contributed by the government of the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

The vaccines, which were transported by Etihad Airways carrier from Abu Dhabi and touched down at Kuala Lumpur International Airport at about 12.15pm, were handed over by the officials from the Embassy of UAE in Malaysia to the officials from Malaysia’s Foreign Ministry (Wisma Putra), Health Ministry and Defence Ministry in a simple ceremony held at the tarmac of KLIA.

Also present were Head of Economic, Political and Media Affairs from the Embassy of UAE in Malaysia Nouf Ibrahim Ali Rashed AlKuwaiti, and undersecretary of West Asia Division of the Foreign Ministry Shahabudeen Adam Shah.

"Malaysia highly values the UAE’s Covid-19 assistance to Malaysia, particularly the vaccine contributions that significantly complement Malaysia’s efforts to address the pandemic.

"The contributions also signify important milestones in the Malaysia-UAE cooperation in the field of health diplomacy to address the Covid-19 pandemic,” Wisma Putra said in a statement.

According to the statement, the first batch of 500,000 doses of Sinopharm vaccines had arrived in Malaysia on January 25.

The UAE announced a pledge to contribute one million doses of Covid-19 vaccines to Malaysia in 2021.

The UAE previously extended Covid-19 assistance to Malaysia such as contributing 20,000 units of Covid-19 PCR test kits in March 2020 and seven tonnes of hand sanitisers made specifically to Wisma Putra’s Diplomatic Equipment Stockpile (MDES) in May the same year.

The UAE is currently Malaysia’s largest trading partner in the Middle East and West Asia regions with bilateral trade volume valued at US$5 billion (RM21 billion) last year.

During the recent floods that hit the Peninsular, the UAE was also the first country to render humanitarian assistance to the victims through the Emirates Red Crescent. — Bernama