The head of EU diplomacy, Josep Borrel, proposed to transfer frozen gold and foreign exchange reserves of Russia to Ukraine for the restoration of the country. Lavrov said that Borrel is known for ideas about the confiscation of other people’s property
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The possible transfer of frozen gold and foreign exchange reserves of Russia to Ukraine is theft, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said at a press conference following his visit to Algeria. The video is published on the YouTube channel of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
“This is, one might even say, theft, which they are not even trying to hide,” Lavrov replied to the question of whether the proposal to transfer Russian money to Kiev for the restoration of the country was robbery.
He said that for the West, theft is becoming “something of a habit”, and cited the freezing of money by the Afghan Central Bank in the United States as an example. “They want to use them not for the needs of the people of Afghanistan, who have suffered from the consequences of the 20-year stay of NATO countries, but they want to use them for some other purposes that are not related to the restoration of the Afghan economy,” he stressed.
The administration of the US president explained the freeze as an attempt to close access to money to the Taliban who came to power (a terrorist organization banned in Russia). In February, President Joe Biden ordered to allocate $7 billion of $9 billion of these assets for humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan and relatives of the victims of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack.
Lavrov also said that the head of EU diplomacy, Josep Borrel, who owns the idea of transferring money for the restoration of Ukraine, is known not only for his ideas in the field of confiscation of other people’s property. The head of the Russian Foreign Ministry advised Borrel not to forget that he is the chief diplomat, not the military head of the EU, because of his words about a military solution to the Ukrainian crisis.
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Lavrov suggested that soon there will be no post of chief diplomat, since the EU does not have its own foreign policy because of the “imposed” approaches of the United States. “But I assure you that we will consistently resist attempts to establish a unipolar world order and destroy the principles on which the UN was founded,” said the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry.
After the start of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, Western countries, including the European Union, froze about $300 billion – half of Russian gold and foreign exchange reserves, the Ministry of Finance reported. The head of the Central Bank, Elvira Nabiullina, said that the Russian side would challenge the freeze in court.
The Ukrainian authorities talked about the desire to get money from Russia’s frozen reserves and use them to restore the country’s infrastructure and economy. President Vladimir Zelensky estimated the cost of recovery after the Russian special operation at $600 billion. Prime Minister Denis Shmygal reported on negotiations with the United States and partners regarding the transfer of funds.
On May 9, Borrel suggested that EU countries consider sending frozen reserves to pay for the costs of rebuilding Ukraine after the hostilities. He called the idea logical and expressed the hope that the initiative of “military compensation” would come from Russia itself.
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