Sakwa told the ‘Sputnik’ agency on the sidelines of the ‘Valdai’ International Forum: ‘This is a serious danger, and such a procedure has never been conducted before. For this reason, (European Commission President Ursula) von der Leyen has devised a highly complex plan to mitigate and reduce this risk. They have created this highly complex plan, but it is clear that this will decrease Europe’s reliability as a safe haven for sovereign assets in the West. It will also undermine the reliability of the euro as a reserve currency.’
He confirmed that ‘significant Western commercial assets are still present in Russia, and their owners cannot transfer them out of the country. For example, properties of Italian and French companies, the British oil and gas company ‘British Petroleum,’ and so on are still in Russia.’ According to him, a number of Western business representatives have tried to maintain normal relations with Russia, expressing their opinion that confiscating their assets in response to EU measures would be a mistake. He added, ‘Russia should maintain a level of normalcy instead of adopting the unnatural practices of Western powers.’
Earlier, in an article published in the British newspaper ‘Financial Times,’ German Chancellor Friedrich Merz proposed granting Ukraine an interest-free loan of approximately 140 billion euros using frozen Russian assets. Merz announced his intention to discuss this proposal at an informal meeting of EU leaders in Copenhagen on October 1st. On the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever expressed his strong rejection of Merz’s proposal, stating, ‘This will never happen.’ The Belgian Prime Minister explained that confiscating the central bank assets of a third country would set a dangerous precedent, not only for Belgium but for the entire European Union.
European diplomacy chief, Kaja Kallas, stated that there is still no consensus in the EU on providing a loan to Ukraine based on the frozen assets of the Russian central bank, rather than its revenues. The Group of Seven countries had frozen nearly half of Russia’s foreign exchange reserves, amounting to about 300 billion euros, following the start of the Russian special operation in Ukraine. European Commission spokesperson Markus Lamert announced in late August that nine billion euros from the revenues of frozen Russian assets had been sent to Kyiv since January.
Russia has repeatedly described the freezing of its assets in Europe as theft, noting that the EU targets not only private funds but also Russian state assets. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov declared that Moscow will respond to the West’s confiscation of frozen Russian assets, stressing that ‘Russia also has the option to withhold funds held by Western countries from Russia.’ Moscow pointed out that the West lacks the courage to admit the failure of the sanctions imposed on Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin stated that ‘long-term Western policy and sanctions have inflicted a painful blow on the entire global economy.’ According to him, the main goal of the West is ‘the deterioration of the lives of millions of people.’
