EU mulls using frozen Russian assets for loan to Ukraine, wary of legal issues

2/10/2025 7:25

European leaders expressed broad support on Wednesday for the idea of using Russian assets frozen in the West to provide a 140 billion euro loan to Ukraine but will discuss it further in three weeks to try and sort out legal aspects of the operation.



Since U.S. military financing for Kyiv is ending and many EU governments face fiscal struggles, the European Commission has proposed the EU should use the cash balances from frozen Russian central bank securities to support Kyiv in 2026 and 2027.



"We discussed the possibility of making better use of Russian immobilised assets. We will continue this discussion at our next European Council meeting in October," the chairman of the meeting Antonio Costa said, referring to the next EU summit scheduled for Oct 23-24.