RNo one spoke to the Ossetian side about plans to seize its assets in favor of Ukraine, but in the event of such a development, Moscow will take retaliatory measures, Peskov said. “It will actually be a direct theft,” he believes
Dmitry Peskov
If foreign countries take measures to use frozen Russian assets to restore Ukraine’s financing, “it will actually be a direct theft.” This was stated to journalists by the press secretary of the President of Russia Dmitry Peskov, the correspondent of RBC.
“Such a decision would be illegal, egregious,” he said and added that such actions would require a response from Moscow.
According to the press secretary of the president, foreign states have not notified Russia about whether such plans exist: “No, no one has told the Russian side and the Kremlin about this.”
Since the beginning of the Russian military operation in Ukraine, Western countries have imposed sanctions against dozens of Russian entrepreneurs and top managers of companies. They were banned from entering, and assets, including shares in companies, accounts and real estate, were frozen. In addition, at the end of February, the European Union and the NSA decided to block the international reserves of the Bank of Russia.
According to the Central Bank, as of April 1, 2022, the volume of international reserves amounted to 606.5 billion in dollar equivalent. Finance Minister Anton Siluanov previously stated that about half of the $300 billion were frozen. Assets in Chinese yuan, monetary gold stored on the territory of Russia (about $132 billion as of February 1), cash reserves, as well as special drawing rights (SDR, about $24 billion) in the International Monetary Fund remain legally inaccessible to sanctions.
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The head of the regulator, Elvira Nabiullina, said that Russia would challenge the freezing of gold and foreign reserves, and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accused Western countries of actually stealing assets.
The Ministry of Economic Development of Ukraine has estimated the size of the frozen gold and foreign exchange reserves of the Russian Central Bank at $415 billion and stated that it is working with Western partners on a mechanism to confiscate this money in favor of Kiev. The head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrel, suggested that the European Union consider this issue. He cited the example of assets “worth billions of dollars” that the United States seized from the Central Bank of Afghanistan,In the future, according to Borrel, the funds will be used to compensate victims of terrorism and for humanitarian assistance to the country.
On May 17, German Finance Minister Christian Lindner announced that the idea of seizing foreign assets of the Russian Central Bank is being discussed among the G7 and EU member states.
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