BRUSSELS — The European Commission reviewed texts sent between Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Pfizer’s chief executive officer and sought by journalists at the height of the pandemic — and allowed them to be lost.

A Commission document sent this week to The New York Times confirms that von der Leyen’s head of cabinet in summer 2021 found the messages sent between the pair ahead of a multibillion-euro vaccine deal agreed between Pfizer and the EU.

The document says that since the messages — which journalists asked to see under a Freedom of Information request — were logistical and “short-lived” in nature, they weren’t considered to be worth registering formally.

The mobile phone used by von der Leyen has been replaced several times since then with the data not having been transferred, the document continued.

In May, the EU’s lower tier General Court ruled that the EU executive was wrong not to release the texts, a decision that Politico revealed this week the Commission will not be contesting at the top tier court.

The case became a flashpoint for transparency activists who said it demonstrated the lack of accountability in von der Leyen’s Commission ― and for people who opposed the use of the vaccine in the first place.

At the beginning of July, von der Leyen successfully saw off a no-confidence vote in the European Parliament over the case, triggered by right-wing Romanian MEP Gheorghe Piperea.