Ukraine can hope to receive a huge new aid package from the Group of Seven (G7) leading democratic industrialized nations for its defence against Russia.
According to a senior EU official on Tuesday evening, an agreement is to be reached at the G7 summit in Italy, which begins on Thursday, to finance a loan of $50 billion for Ukraine with interest from frozen Russian state assets.
Ukraine could then use the money to strengthen its defence against Russia and pay for the reconstruction of destroyed infrastructure. In addition, possible financial bottlenecks in the Ukrainian state budget could be offset, the EU official explained.
The plans could help to utilize interest income from frozen Russian state assets even more effectively in future. The EU states had recently already decided to make them available directly to finance military aid for Ukraine.
This year alone, up to €3 billion ($3.22 billion) is to be raised for Ukraine, but the effect could now be significantly increased once again via the so-called credit lever.
According to the European Commission, around €210 billion from the Russian central bank has been frozen in the EU. The Brussels-based financial institution Euroclear recently announced that it had collected around €4.4 billion in interest in 2023. It is by far the most important institution in the EU that holds assets belonging to the Russian central bank.
There are currently no plans to utilize the Russian central bank's funds directly through an expropriation order.
One reason for this is legal concerns and the likelihood of retaliatory measures. It is conceivable, for example, that companies from EU countries operating in Russia could also be expropriated.