Ukraine wants to receive all frozen Russian assets, - Shmyhal

Ukraine wants to receive all frozen Russian assets, - Shmyhal

Ukraine aims to achieve full confiscation of Russian frozen assets – in 2022, the "Group of Seven" (G7) countries froze about 300 billion euros of the Russian Central Bank’s assets. The importance of this issue is explained by the fact that these assets should become the main source for the country’s recovery. At the same time, Ukraine is already benefiting from frozen Russian assets.

This was reported by Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal. He noted, in particular:

• last week (March 3-9), Ukraine received 752 million pounds from the United Kingdom (40.39 billion UAH at the current NBU rate);
• on March 13 – 2.5 billion Canadian dollars from Canada (72.1 billion UAH).

"One of the priorities for this year remains working on the creation of a mechanism for the confiscation of Russian frozen assets. The work on asset confiscation is conducted not only abroad but also in Ukraine. Tens of billions of hryvnias from sanctioned individuals, Russian banks, and companies have already been directed by the Government to restore and protect our state," the message says.

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister noted, the Asset Recovery and Management Agency (ARMA) will sell court-confiscated military bonds of the Russian company "Royal Pay Europe" for a total amount of about 1.8 billion UAH. These funds will be:

• transferred to the budget;
• then directed to the Ukraine Recovery Fund.

"This became possible thanks to a new mechanism for managing sanctioned assets that are seized in the framework of criminal proceedings. It allows ARMA, with the approval of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, to sell military bonds purchased with seized funds and direct the profits to the state budget," the agency stated in its own statement.

They also recalled that previously, funds from the company "Royal Pay Europe" were directed to the Fund for the Elimination of the Consequences of Armed Aggression from managing seized assets. The amount was over 423 million UAH.