Russia promises to respond in kind if EU uses its frozen assets
Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov addresses the 78th Session of the U.N. General Assembly in New York City, U.S., Sept. 23. Reuters-Yonhap
Russia on Thursday promised to respond in kind should the European Union go ahead with a plan to ringfence profits generated from Russia's frozen assets in the EU and hand them to Ukraine.
The EU is proposing to use the income generated from around $300 billion of funds from Russian central bank reserves — frozen in February 2022 to put pressure on Moscow to withdraw the armed forces it had sent into Ukraine — and could ultimately collect around $16 billion.
"We also have enough assets that are frozen here, in type-C accounts," Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said in an interview on the Russia 24 TV channel.
"The figures are not small, the income from using these funds is substantial and can certainly also be used if a decision is made by our unfriendly partners," he said.
Western sanctions imposed in response to the conflict and subsequent Russian countermeasures have stranded assets on both sides.
Prosecutors in Germany on Wednesday said they were applying to confiscate more than 720 million euros ($790 million) from the Frankfurt bank account of a Russian financial institution.
A source familiar with the matter told Reuters the institution was the National Settlement Depository (NSD), the domestic payments agent owned by Moscow Exchange, which plays an important role in Russia's financial system as a key intermediary with international markets.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called German leaders "a thieving lot" after being asked about Berlin's plans, and said they had been taking lessons from Washington.
"They used to be thieving in the political sense — breaking agreements, cheating someone — but now they are thieving in the direct sense," he told a press conference in Tunis. (Reuters)