Belgium’s prime minister has poured cold water on the European Commission’s proposal to use immobilised Russian central bank assets to fund a ‘reparation loan’ to Ukraine.
The move throws a giant wrench in the EU executive’s plan to use the cash balances associated with €200 billion in frozen assets to support Kyiv’s budget needs and reconstruction.
Most of the assets are held in Euroclear, a Brussels-based clearing house – making Belgium a key player in EU negotiations.
“Taking Putin’s money and leaving the risks with [Belgium]. That’s not going to happen, let me be very clear about that,” Prime Minister Bart De Wever on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meeting in New York.
“If countries see that central bank money can disappear if European politicians see fit, they might decide to withdraw their reserves from the eurozone,” he added.
“If countries see that central bank money can disappear if European politicians see fit, they might decide to withdraw their reserves from the eurozone,” he added.
Maybe if they are planning to invade a peaceful democratic neighbor they should.
Fuck Belgium for being pussies!!! My respect for Belgium just dropped dramatically.
This has been planned for years now, and I thought it was practically a sure thing. Is Belgium playing lapdog to France?Fuck France too for saying this.
There will be a trial against Russia, and they will have to pay damages to Ukraine, and we must make sure they do.I don’t think this was ever the plan? We were gonna use investment profits from the money to benefit Ukraine, and we’re doing that.
Some countries are already giving Ukraine the interest Russians have earned, and yes the plan was absolutely to give Ukraine compensation from the frozen Russian assets.
I smell a rat when France and Belgium are suddenly backtracking on that.
“If countries see that central bank money can disappear if European politicians see fit, they might decide to withdraw their reserves from the eurozone,” he added.
What’s the problem there? You don’t get the privilege of working with bloodthirsty imperialist powers like Putin’s Russia?
If someone’s about to do some shady shit, transferring all their money out is one more piece of information that could be observed and fed to the analysts to gauge how serious they are about it. Seems useful.
I’m guessing he’s afraid Israel might pull their money. Jews are a large (economic) influence in Antwerp, his hometown.
Maybe we should freeze Israels assets too?
Maybe we shouldn’t do business with criminal rogue states.We should, but with “leaders” like that we won’t.
It’s Russia’s money, not Putin’s. It’ll come free after regime change, to benefit repaired bonds.
One could argue forced reparations lead directly to Hitler’s success. We have to leave a chance to not make that mistake again.
“If countries see that central bank money can disappear if European politicians see fit, they might decide to withdraw their reserves from the eurozone,” he added.
I mean, the assets were frozen. I imagine that if someone is planning to invade Ukraine a second time around, the freezing alone is probably sufficient to make them not want to store assets there while doing so.
Belgium being Belgium.
