Borrell told about the EU's plan to use frozen russian assets

The head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, said that the EU has developed a plan that will allow it to withdraw the proceeds of frozen russian assets and direct them to the needs of Ukraine.

According to Borrell, after the start of russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the EU froze the assets of the Central Bank of the russian federation worth about 300 billion euros. Currently, the russian assets are managed by central securities depositories and generate extraordinary profits due to the fact that the interest rate has increased significantly.

Experts have finally managed to find a legal basis to confiscate these revenues and transfer them to Ukraine.

"We decided to pursue the goal of using these revenues to support Ukraine in stages. As a first step, adopted by the Council in February, we have introduced rules for the central securities depositories that generate these proceeds to identify them, keep them aside and account for them separately," explained the EU high representative.

Borrell noted that now the proceeds of frozen russian assets are accumulated in separate accounts. According to European experts, such a mechanism will generate about 3 billion euros a year.

"And, in addition, we are increasing legal certainty by making it clear that these revenues do not belong to russia, as they are not sovereign assets. Let me clarify the difference between capital and revenues - I'm talking about revenues," he said.

Initially, the EU planned to use these funds to rebuild Ukraine after the war. But Josep Borrell proposed that the EU Council direct the proceeds from russian assets to the European Peace Fund to be used to purchase weapons and ammunition for Ukraine.

Source: official website of the European Commission