War in Ukraine. The 27 of the EU want to “move forward” on aid to kyiv via frozen Russian assets
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The Twenty-Seven, meeting at a summit in Brussels, decided on Thursday to move forward with a project aimed at using profits from Russia’s frozen assets in the EU to arm Ukraine.
In a joint statement, the leaders of EU member countries said they wanted to “move forward work” on a proposal presented Wednesday by the European Commission, which should make it possible to free up between 2.5 and three billion euros per year in favor of kyiv.
“Use some of that money”
The head of European diplomacy Josep Borrell proposed on Wednesday using the profits from frozen Russian assets to finance military equipment for Ukraine.
“We are determined to act very quickly so that we can use part of this money to support Ukraine,” said the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, during a press conference on Thursday evening.
How to use Russian state assets that were blocked after Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine two years ago has been the subject of intense discussion.
Russia on Wednesday threatened the European Union with legal action “for decades” if the income from its frozen assets is used.
210 billion euros
“Europeans must be well aware of the damage that such decisions could cause to their economy, their image, their reputation as reliable guarantors of the inviolability of property,” warned Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov.
But according to Josep Borrell, the proposal he put on the table is “safe” from a legal point of view, because it targets a private investor, and not the frozen assets of the Russian Central Bank.
These represent around 210 billion euros in the European Union, and are almost all in the hands of Euroclear, a financial institution based in Brussels.
Most of the windfall generated by the interest earned on these assets should make it possible to facilitate the purchase of weapons for Ukraine, and this from July if the 27 manage to quickly formalize their project, according to Josep Borrell.
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