{"id":1179041,"date":"2026-08-31T14:07:31","date_gmt":"2026-08-31T14:07:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1179041\/"},"modified":"2026-08-31T14:07:31","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T14:07:31","slug":"belgian-government-opposes-using-frozen-russian-assets-to-support-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1179041\/","title":{"rendered":"Belgian government opposes using frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Belgian Defense Minister Theo Francken said this on VRT, Ukrinform reports, citing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.euractiv.com\/news\/belgium-slams-door-on-using-russian-assets-for-ukraine\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Euractiv<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is non-negotiable, the door is closed,&#8221; Francken said.<\/p>\n<p>Last week, Sweden, Poland, the Netherlands and Spain called upon the European Commission to explore new ways to harness around EUR 200 billion in immobilized Russian assets to support Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p>At a dramatic European summit last December, Bart De Wever, the Belgian leader, shot down an effort led by Germany and the European Commission, to fashion a EUR 210 billion &#8220;reparations loan&#8221; for Ukraine, arguing it would leave the Benelux nation exposed to Russian legal retribution.<\/p>\n<p>Most of the assets are held at Euroclear in Belgium. &#8220;Our prime minister will stand firm,&#8221; Francken added.<\/p>\n<p><b>Read also: <\/b><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ukrinform.net\/rubric-polytics\/4158784-sybiha-to-attend-informal-meeting-of-eu-foreign-ministers-in-dublin.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Sybiha to attend informal meeting of EU foreign ministers in Dublin<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Noting that Belgium&#8217;s resistance has generated resentment, he singled out the Baltic states \u2013 who are the strongest supporters of the reparations loan \u2013 for refusing to drop it.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They should also be careful about constantly bringing this issue up again and putting us in a corner. I don&#8217;t think that is wise,&#8221; Francken said, adding that Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia receive a lot of support from Belgium.<\/p>\n<p>The news outlet notes that Francken&#8217;s tough tone differs somewhat from the way Maxime Prevot, the Belgian foreign minister, has talked about the scheme this month. Prevot appeared to leave the door open to using the immobilized assets, this month, on the condition that all legal responsibility is fairly shared out among EU countries.<\/p>\n<p>The Swedish letter in which the four EU countries called for returning to the discussion of the immobilized Russian assets acknowledged the legal risks inherent in using the Russian assets, and stated that no country should bear a disproportionate burden.<\/p>\n<p>As reported, EU foreign ministers will discuss resuming talks on ways to use Russian assets frozen in Europe in Ukraine&#8217;s interests at an informal Gymnich-format meeting in early September.<\/p>\n<p>A coalition of EU member states is calling on the European Commission to renew efforts to use frozen Russian sovereign assets to finance Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p>According to Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha, Ukraine believes it is time to step up work on a legal mechanism for using frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine.<\/p>\n<p>Photo: Theo Francken \/ Facebook<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Belgian Defense Minister Theo Francken said this on VRT, Ukrinform reports, citing Euractiv. &#8220;This is non-negotiable, the door&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1179042,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[7654],"tags":[2000,299,657],"class_list":["post-1179041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ukraine","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-ukraine"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/117190514914927405","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1179041","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1179041"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1179041\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1179042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1179041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1179041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1179041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}