In 2024, Belgium will transfer €1.7 billion to help Ukraine — these are taxes on income from frozen Russian assets.
This was stated by Prime Minister of Belgium Alexander De Croo at a joint briefing with President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The financial institutions of Belgium and the European Union have frozen Russian assets and income from them, but Brussels has access to taxes from these incomes, which it will transfer to Ukraine.
To transfer assets and income, EU legislation would have to be changed, but so far this has not happened.
Belgium became the first country to initiate such a practice of using frozen Russian assets to support Ukraine.
Who and how can transfer frozen Russian assets to Ukraine
Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, the EU has frozen the assets of the Russian Central Bank for more than €200 billion. A significant part of these funds is kept in the Euroclear depository and has already brought almost €750 million in profit in the first quarter of 2023. In addition, the EU has frozen €24.1 billion in assets belonging to Russians and Russian companies under sanctions. Recently, the USA froze another $8 billion of Russian assets.
Currently, the United States and the European Union are looking for legal opportunities to use all $300 billion of frozen Russian assets for the benefit of Ukraine. Meanwhile, Ukraine expects to receive $300-500 billion from such assets.
On September 7, the United States announced that for the first time it would transfer the confiscated assets of Russian oligarchs to Ukraine. We are talking about $5.4 million, which will go to support Ukrainian veterans. After that, Estonia announced that it plans to become the first country in the EU to transfer confiscated Russian assets (€35 million) to Ukraine.