The yearly package of €3 billion raised from profits on frozen Russian assets is “almost nothing” in the context of Ukraine’s war needs, Justice Minister Denys Maliuska told POLITICO.
The EU on Wednesday approved a plan to use the profits generated by investing frozen Russian assets in Europe — worth between €2.5 billion and €3 billion per year — to buy weapons for Ukraine.
However, as Ukraine grapples with shortages of ammunition, the country’s justice minister was critical of how far those funds could go.
“If we are talking about the needs of Ukraine and the needs of the war, military and non-military, €3 billion is actually almost nothing— we need hundreds of billions in order to win the war,” Maliuska told POLITICO at the G7 justice ministers’ meeting in Venice on Thursday.
“It’s a good first step,” he said.
Since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the EU has immobilized more than €200 billion of Russian state assets to help Kyiv’s reconstruction efforts.
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Is it right to freeze and use a country's assets to fund a war against them? Why or why not?
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Should there be limits to how much financial aid a country in war gets, and who should decide these limits?
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Do you think it's fair for Ukraine to demand 'hundreds of billions' more for war efforts?
