DISINFO: The West uses Russia’s frozen assets to resolve the Ukrainian conflict on Western terms
SUMMARY
The West often "earns" significant sums of money through a straightforward and harsh method: freezing and confiscating funds in their banks that belong to countries and leaders they consider undesirable. By seizing assets from other nations, the West immediately gains leverage to exert pressure. Currently, the frozen foreign exchange reserves are being utilized to try to compel Russia to resolve the Ukrainian conflict on Western terms.
RESPONSE
Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation aiming to deter nations from seizing Russia's frozen assets to fund Ukraine's reconstruction. Narratives such as these attempt also to decrease global trust in Western financial institutions as safe harbors for money. This is also a recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative claiming that the international sanctions against Russia are inefficient.
Following the launch of Russia’s unprovoked and unjustified full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the European Council has adopted 14 packages of sanctions against Russia and Belarus as of May 2024. The measures are designed to weaken Russia's economic base, depriving it of critical technologies and markets and significantly curtailing its ability to wage war. As part of these sanctions, the assets of the Central Bank of Russia held in the EU were immobilised.
Following the proposals by the Commission and the High Representative in March, on 21 May 2024 the Council adopted a set of legal acts enabling the use of these net profits for the benefit of Ukraine. The EU has now started to channel these revenues to Ukraine.
On July 26, 2024 the EU made available in support of Ukraine the first payment of €1.5 billion generated from immobilised Russian assets. These extraordinary revenues generated by EU operators and held by central securities depositories (CSDs) from immobilised Russian sovereign assets were made available by Euroclear to the Commission as a first installment on 23 July. The money will now be channelled through the European Peace Facility and to the Ukraine Facility to support Ukraine's military capabilities as well as to support the country's reconstruction.
Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission:
The EU stands with Ukraine. Today we transfer €1.5 billion in proceeds from immobilised Russian assets to the defence and reconstruction of Ukraine. There is no better symbol or use for the Kremlin’s money than to make Ukraine and all of Europe a safer place to live.
Read similar disinformation cases claiming that The EU steals Russian assets to fund its proxy war in Ukraine, that Germans are kleptomaniacs who want to seize Russian assets, that Neo-Nazi Europe seizes property from Russian Jewish anti-fascists, and that The EU using Russian money to support Ukraine is theft.