{"id":7687,"date":"2026-03-22T14:21:21","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T14:21:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/7687\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T14:21:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T14:21:21","slug":"legal-opinions-contradict-belgiums-claims-over-russian-assets-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/7687\/","title":{"rendered":"Legal opinions contradict Belgium\u2019s claims over Russian assets \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>But according to two legal opinions \u2014 one prepared by law firm Covington &amp; Burling, another by a group of international legal scholars \u2014 assert that the risk of a successful legal claim against Belgium over the assets is minimal.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The main reason cited by the scholars is that it would be nearly impossible for Russia to find a jurisdiction willing to hear a case against Belgium or to enforce a claim against the Belgian government or Euroclear over the assets.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Any judgment of a Russian court would not be recognized or enforced in the EU or the U.K. on public policy grounds,&#8221; six legal scholars <a href=\"https:\/\/libmod.de\/legal-opinion-on-the-reparations-loan-for-ukraine\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">wrote in a paper<\/a>, adding that the Russian central bank is unlikely to bring claims in either U.K. or EU jurisdictions because doing so would waive its sovereign immunity.<\/p>\n<p>A claim brought before the Court of Justice of the European Union, the International Court of Justice or any comparable international institution would prove similarly problematic, largely because Russia doesn&#8217;t accept their jurisdiction, argue the authors of a <a href=\"https:\/\/files.lbr.cloud\/public\/2025-12\/White%20Paper%20on%20the%20Minimal%20Litigation%20Risk%20to%20EU%20Member%20States%20of%20the%20EU%27s%20Reparation%20Loan%20%283%29.pdf?VersionId=RS1y6Nkx3rneHxqnkgEWd0EBn.dd0aWp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">paper by Covington &amp; Burling<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In his letter to von der Leyen, De Wever raised the fact that Belgium has a bilateral investment treaty with Russia that exposes Brussels to legal risk in the event of a dispute. The letter cites specialized law firms but does not name them.<\/p>\n<p>The authors of both legal opinions assert that Russia would not be able to pursue its claim against Belgium or the EU via such a treaty because the treaty doesn&#8217;t cover sovereign assets. &#8220;A Tribunal constituted pursuant to such a treaty would lack jurisdiction to hear a dispute relating to alleged expropriation of Russia&#8217;s sovereign assets,&#8221; wrote Covington &amp; Burling.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"But according to two legal opinions \u2014 one prepared by law firm Covington &amp; Burling, another by a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7688,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[2935,76,7,5579,1395,785,390,235,5580,88,260,300],"class_list":["post-7687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-belgium","tag-banks","tag-bart-de-wever","tag-belgium","tag-central-banks","tag-courts","tag-investment","tag-russia","tag-security","tag-stability","tag-ukraine","tag-united-kingdom","tag-ursula-von-der-leyen"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116273275403600440","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7687"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7687\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}