BRUSSELS — Europe confiscating almost €200 billion of frozen Russian assets would be “an act of war,” Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever told reporters late Thursday night.
Speaking after a gathering of EU leaders in Brussels, he warned that the move would carry “systemic risks to the entire financial world system” and spark retaliation from Moscow.
De Wever’s warning comes as European countries including France, the U.K. and Spain are warming to the idea of seizing Russian assets that were immobilized after President Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Their idea is to use this money itself to bolster Ukraine’s defense and strengthen its leverage in peace talks with Russia.
Belgium, however, has considerable skin in the game because Euroclear, the financial institution that holds the bulk of the immobilized assets in Europe, is based in Brussels.
The country fears that handing over the money to Ukraine will expose Euroclear to more legal claims by the holders of those assets.
Euroclear is currently embroiled in litigation with multiple parties who are using Russia’s highly politicized courts to contest their assets being withheld, and seeking compensation.
“We’re not living in a world of fantasy. We’re in the real world, where if you take €200 billion from somebody there will be consequences,” De Wever said.
Last year G7 countries agreed to use the profits generated by the assets — rather than the assets directly — to issue a €50 billion loan to Ukraine.
But several countries are pushing to go one step further. Earlier this month, French lawmakers backed a nonbinding resolution calling for the EU to seize the assets and use them to support Ukraine.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez supported this option behind closed doors in a gathering of EU leaders on March 6, according to several EU diplomats.
De Wever cautioned fellow leaders to refrain from publicly “representing the frozen and immobilized assets like Putin’s little piggy bank that you can just break with a hammer and then take the money out and spend it on whatever you want … because it’s just not that simple.”
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