The European Union should explore the possibility of using the profits from the frozen assets of the Russian Central Bank to finance the joint purchase of military equipment for supply to Ukraine, the President of the European Commission suggested this Wednesday in a debate on security and defense in European Parliament in Strasbourg.
“This is the time to start a conversation about using the windfall profits from frozen Russian assets for the joint purchase of military equipment for Ukraine. “There could be no stronger symbol and no better use of this money than to make Ukraine and all of Europe a safer place to live,” said Ursula von der Leyen.
More than twothirds of the Russian Central Bank's approximately 260 billion euros of reserves and assets (securities and cash), which were shut down by the application of sanctions after the largescale invasion of Ukraine, are located in the European Union the European Union's largest Volume is deposited with Euroclear based in Belgium.
Three weeks ago, Member States adopted a decision and a regulation determining the legal status of the income from these fixed assets which, due to the rise in interest rates, accumulated an “extraordinary balance” already estimated at around 15 billion euros in the EU and settled sets out a number of rules for depositories.
This was the first phase of a process in which the 27 hope that these accumulated profits will be used to finance Ukraine's reconstruction. The legal modalities for this are still being examined, but the Council of the European Union clearly indicates this objective in its decision of February 12: the text speaks of the “possible creation of a financial contribution” to the Community budget from these net profits. “
In her intervention on Wednesday, the President of the European Commission added a new element to this equation by putting on the table the possibility of using this money for the joint purchase of “military equipment”. Ursula von der Leyen was careful not to explicitly mention the purchase of weapons or ammunition that the Ukrainian army urgently needs in the face of the renewed onslaught of Russian occupation troops and which cannot be financed from the Community budget.
Von der Leyen, who was not invited to attend the highlevel conference organized by French President Emmanuel Macron this Monday, joined the chorus of heads of state and government warning of the need for the European Union to “urgently” disband The crisis must be prepared for the “risks” and “threat” of war. “It may not be imminent, but it is not impossible,” warned the chairman of the Community executive board, who presented a list of tasks for member states and the EU, the first of which is the “reconstruction, recovery and modernization” of their armed forces includes forces.
“Europe must strive to develop and produce the next generation of combatcritical operational capabilities to ensure that it has sufficient material and technological superiority that it may need in the future,” said Von der Leyen, who promised “in the… to present in the coming weeks”, his proposal for the first ever European defense industrial strategy.
“One of the central objectives of the strategy and the accompanying European defense investment program is to give priority to joint defense purchases,” he predicted, explaining that the Commission is considering using the same model as previously tried successfully in the procurement of vaccines and natural gas . “It helps reduce fragmentation and increase interoperability,” he said.
Von der Leyen insisted that the moment demands “ambitious decisions and political courage” from European leaders, alluding, without ever mentioning his name, to the possible impact of Donald Trump’s reelection as president of the United States the European security architecture.
“We have no control over elections or decisions in other parts of the world and we have no time to circumvent the problem,” stressed the Commission President, who repeated the words of Emmanuel Macron, who insisted that Europe must “take” “To take responsibility” for its security and to create all the conditions for Ukraine to counter Russian aggression and prevail. “With or without the support of our partners, we cannot allow Russia to win the war,” he said.