March 27 (Reuters) - Federal prosecutors in Manhattan

are probing a claim by GSK that Pfizer delayed

announcing its COVID shot's success in 2020 until after that

year's election, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people

familiar with the matter.

The report said on Wednesday GSK's former head of vaccine

development, Philip Dormitzer, had told his colleagues about the

delay by Pfizer, where he worked before joining the British

company.

However, Dormitzer has disputed the claims of his former

colleagues.

"My Pfizer colleagues and I did everything we could to get

the FDA's Emergency Use Authorization at the very first possible

moment. Any other interpretation of my comments about the pace

of the vaccine's development would be incorrect," Dormitzer told

Reuters.

The WSJ report said the U.S. Attorney's Office for the

Southern District of New York, which includes Manhattan, is

taking a closer look at GSK's claims.

"We cannot comment because we have not received any inquiry

from authorities about a so-called 'delay,' but Pfizer remains

ready, willing, and able to explain why any allegation of

impropriety is utter nonsense," Pfizer told Reuters.

U.S. President Donald Trump has claimed in the past that

Pfizer sat on positive data from the vaccine's clinical trials,

but there was no evidence.

"We have consistently and transparently reiterated the facts

and the timeline of the tireless work of scientists, regulators,

and thousands of clinical trial volunteers who made the vaccine

possible. Theories to the contrary are simply untrue," Pfizer

said.

The U.S. Attorney's Office in Manhattan has interviewed at

least two people, including a GSK executive who took notes of a

conversation with Dormitzer, the report said.

The prosecutors are planning more interviews in the coming

days, the report said, adding that Pfizer officials have not yet

been interviewed.

GSK declined to comment, while the U.S. Attorney's Office

did not immediately respond to Reuters' requests for comments.

(Reporting by Puyaan Singh and Mariam Sunny in Bengaluru;

Additional reporting by Michael Erman; Editing by Shreya Biswas

and Shinjini Ganguli)