Ukraine expects to receive $4 billion from frozen Russian assets in 2024 - Ministry of Justice
This year, Ukraine expects to transfer $4 billion of Russian assets frozen by the G7 and the EU.
According to Censor.NET, Deputy Minister of Justice Iryna Mudra told this in an interview with Forbes.
According to her, Ukraine can receive a total of $15-18 billion over the next four years, including about $4 billion this year. To do this, we need to go through several stages. Step zero is to determine which institutions have these funds, which has already been done.
The first step is that the European Commission has already made a decision: all accrued interest should be placed in one institution. The second is to introduce legislation in the EU that allows for the transfer of these funds to Ukraine.
"We had talks with representatives of Belgium, which currently holds the presidency of the EU Council. There is cautious optimism that the EU Council will decide by the end of June 2024. If the decision is made, Ukraine will receive interest on the assets that were repaid in 2024," the deputy head of the Ministry of Justice said.
We are also discussing the transfer of interest already accrued for 2022-2023. These funds are located in Belgium, and in 2022 a 25% tax was imposed on them (about €1.7 billion). The Belgian government uses these funds to pay Ukrainian refugees, provide humanitarian aid, etc.
The funds for 2023 have not yet been taxed. Negotiations are underway to impose a 100% tax on these funds and transfer them to Ukraine. We are talking about 4.4 billion euros, which can be transferred with the decision of the Belgian government alone.
"Our principled position is that this should be additional funding, not part of the aid already agreed with the EU. Most likely, international partners will not agree to use these funds for the defense sector. They will be used to cover the budget deficit, social payments, reconstruction projects, etc." Mudra summarized.
