French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said on Tuesday 24 May that there was “unanimity” among Member States to quickly implement the European Commission’s recent proposal to provide up to $9 billion in new emergency macrofinancial assistance to Ukraine in the face of a Russian military invasion (see EUROPE 12955/2).
“We believe that we must do the maximum financially” for Ukraine, said the President-in-Office of the Ecofin Council, highlighting that France had already provided $2 billion in commitments and the G7 almost $20 billion (see EUROPE 12957/2).
European Commission Vice-President Valdis Dombrovskis said that the proposal would be officially unveiled “at the beginning of June”, with the EU summit on 30-31 May expected to provide guidance on the issue. The assistance would consist of long-term soft loans, with a grant component to support Ukrainian interest rates, Mr Dombrovskis said. According to him, a first tranche could be disbursed “before the summer break”, following the current macrofinancial assistance of €1.2 billion (see EUROPE 12957/2).
Among the technical details to be finalised is the possibility of mobilising the EU budget as a public guarantee for macrofinancial assistance to Ukraine.
Confiscation of assets. Asked about the possibility of confiscating Russian assets frozen by Member States to help finance the reconstruction of Ukraine, Mr Le Maire simply said that the idea was worth examining.
For Mr Dombrovskis, if there is a basis for confiscation of assets in the criminal legal order of the Member States where these frozen assets are located, then “these assets can also be used”.
At the World Economic Summit in Davos, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that, “we should leave no stone unturned” in financing the reconstruction of Ukraine, “including, if possible, using Russian assets”.
Like many member states, “Germany is politically open” to a discussion about using seized Russian sovereign assets for the reconstruction of Ukraine, said German Finance Minister Christian Lindner. He considered it necessary to “differentiate between sovereign assets and private assets”, the latter benefiting from specific guarantees linked to private property.
Last week, a French source in Bercy qualified the EU’s ability to confiscate frozen Russian assets. The EU regulatory framework is “ very protective of private property”, because “today, sanctions only allow for the freezing of assets”, she said, adding that “a seizure of these assets (was) only possible if the person targeted tries to circumvent the sanctions”. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion with Anne Damiani)