The amount of Russian assets frozen in the West is constantly growing

Ivan Zubov

At the end of October, Novye Izvestia reported, citing a statement by the EU Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders, that the EU authorities, as part of the sanctions imposed against Russia, froze the assets of almost a hundred Russian oligarchs totaling 17 billion euros. And even earlier, in June 2022, the US Treasury Department announced that it had frozen Russian assets worth $330 billion. The British authorities did not stand aside either, which froze Russian assets totaling 18.39 billion pounds ($20.95 billion).

However, the matter was not limited to this: the American publication Politico, citing an internal document of the European Commission, reports that the volume of Russian assets frozen by the European Union is already 68 billion euros. Moreover, 50 billion (73.5%) of the frozen assets fall on Belgium, 5.5 billion - on Luxembourg. In addition, Austria, Germany, Italy, Ireland and France are actively participating in the process. Of this money, Russia's national reserves are estimated to be around 33.8 billion euros, with the rest of the money owned by Russian oligarchs.

Moreover, the European Council is preparing a new law that would make it a criminal offense to deviate from sanctions, which would greatly simplify the process of confiscating Russian assets. Moreover, the European Prosecutor's Office is going to continue to prosecute the assets of Russians who fell under the sanctions. An asset freeze is an EU "preliminary interim measure", European officials explain, while seized assets, the illegal receipt of which will be proven in court, can be appropriated to the state. It is expected that the European Union will adopt documents, based on which the frozen and confiscated assets can be used to restore the economy of Ukraine, which suffered from the hostilities.