Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever has said that the European Commission will no longer propose using frozen Russian assets to finance Ukraine. The Commission has not yet confirmed the Belgian prime minister’s words.
After the start of the full-scale war, Western countries froze around $300 billion of Russian state reserves. But in four and a half years of war, the European Union has still not agreed on how to use this money to help Ukraine and who would be liable for possible lawsuits and financial losses. The United States is also laying claim to the Russian assets, proposing to channel them into, among other things, investment projects under American management. Moscow calls the possible seizure of the reserves “robbery” and is trying to get the money back through the courts.
In brief
- After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Western countries froze around $300 billion of Russian state reserves. Most of this money is held in Europe
- The EU already uses the income from the frozen assets to help Ukraine, but the reserves themselves remain untouched
- Belgium, where most of the Russian funds are frozen, remains the main opponent of confiscation. It fears lawsuits from Russia and demands that other EU countries share the financial risks
- The United States also proposes using the Russian assets – including for investment projects under American management. European countries oppose handing control of this money to the Americans
- Russia is trying to recover the frozen funds through the courts
- Experts disagree on what the financial and legal consequences of confiscating Russian reserves would be
The European Union sees the frozen Russian reserves as one way to keep helping Ukraine without increasing spending from its own budgets. Since the start of the full-scale war, European countries have mobilised €228.7 billion to support Ukraine, including military and financial aid as well as spending on Ukrainian refugees in the EU. In October, Volodymyr Zelensky called on European leaders to allocate at least another €70 billion for 2027.
The situation is complicated by the fact that US aid has fallen sharply since 2025, and the main burden of supporting Ukraine has shifted to Europe.
Where the Russian reserves are held
Until 2022, Russia kept a significant share of its international reserves abroad – in foreign government bonds, in bank accounts and with international depositories. These funds served as a financial safety cushion: the Central Bank could use them to support the rouble and stabilise the economy.
At the beginning of 2022, Russia’s international reserves stood at around $630 billion. They comprised foreign currency, securities and gold. The gold, however, was mostly held in Russia, and a significant share of the yuan-denominated assets in China.
After the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Western countries blocked Moscow’s access to part of its foreign reserves. As early as 28 February, Washington prohibited transactions with the Bank of Russia, the Russian Ministry of Finance and the National Wealth Fund. The European Union introduced similar restrictions.
As a result, Russia lost access to around $300 billion of its reserves. Formally, the assets remained Russian property, but the Central Bank could no longer dispose of them.
Most of the funds ended up frozen in Belgium, home to the international depository Euroclear. According to estimates at the end of 2025, it held around €185 billion of Russian sovereign assets. By mid-2026, Euroclear was already reporting €202 billion. This is because a significant part of the blocked funds was originally invested in foreign bonds. As these mature, the money flows into Euroclear’s accounts but, because of the sanctions, cannot be transferred to Russia.
The second-largest volume of Russian reserves in the EU is held in France – according to estimates at the end of 2025, around €18–19 billion. The funds are spread across commercial banks and other financial institutions; the French authorities do not disclose which ones.
Part of the Russian Central Bank’s reserves is also frozen in Luxembourg, Germany and Sweden.
Belgium objects
The idea of using frozen Russian reserves to help Ukraine has been discussed since 2022. Initially, it was proposed simply to seize the money, but European countries feared lawsuits, retaliation from Moscow and a loss of confidence in the European financial system. In the end, the EU decided not to touch the reserves themselves but to channel the income from them to Ukraine.
In May 2024, the European Union authorised the use of profits from Russian reserves for military aid to Ukraine and the country’s reconstruction. Initially, 90% of the proceeds were earmarked for the European Peace Facility and the remaining 10% for EU programmes. In the same year, the G7 countries agreed loans to Ukraine of around $50 billion, to be repaid from future income from the Russian assets.
In autumn 2025, the European Commission proposed going further and using the money that had accumulated directly in depositories after Russian bonds matured. This gave rise to the “reparations loan” plan: Ukraine would receive interest-free financing and repay it only once Russia had paid reparations. The Commission argued that this was not confiscation, as Russia’s right to the assets formally remained intact.
The main opponent of the plan was Belgium, where most of the frozen reserves are held. Prime Minister Bart De Wever warned that Russia could demand the return of the money through the courts, and that it would be Belgium and Euroclear, above all, that would have to answer for it. The Belgian government demanded that the other EU countries share legal and financial liability with Belgium, and that funds frozen in France and other EU countries be included in the scheme.
These conditions led to fresh disagreements: European governments were unwilling to take on financial obligations of unpredictable size.
On 3 December 2025, the European Commission presented two options for financing Ukraine: a reparations loan funded by Russian assets or joint EU borrowing backed by guarantees from the EU budget.
Germany, Poland, the Baltic states and the Nordic countries supported using the Russian reserves. Belgium demanded guarantees; Italy, Bulgaria, Malta and the Czech Republic proposed finding another way to finance Ukraine; and Hungary and Slovakia opposed any new financial commitments to Kyiv in principle.
At the summit on 18–19 December 2025, European leaders failed to agree on using the Russian reserves. Instead, the EU decided to provide Ukraine with €90 billion for 2026–2027 with borrowed money. The possibility of using Russian assets was, however, not ruled out.
The issue was revisited this year, at the October EU summit, but again to no avail. On 19 October, European Commission spokesperson Balazs Ujvari said it was too early to discuss specific options for financing Ukraine. According to him, EU countries had tasked the Commission with examining possible solutions, and that work is still ongoing.
The United States is also seeking a say in what happens to the frozen Russian reserves. Under Joe Biden, Washington pushed for the money to be used to help Ukraine, while under Donald Trump it has proposed directing it to investment projects, including ones involving Russia.
In April 2024, Biden signed the REPO Act, which allowed Russian state assets in the US to be confiscated to help Ukraine. However, only about $5 billion of such funds were under US control. In December of the same year, Washington provided Ukraine with a $20 billion loan as part of the G7’s overall $50 billion programme. The money was to be repaid from income from the frozen reserves.
In November 2025, the published draft of Trump’s 28-point peace plan proposed directing $100 billion of frozen Russian assets to the reconstruction of Ukraine under US leadership. Washington was to receive 50% of the profits from the investments, Europe was to invest an additional $100 billion, and the remaining Russian funds were to be used for joint US-Russian projects.
In October 2026, according to the Financial Times, US officials again proposed transferring part of the frozen reserves to an investment vehicle under US control. The initiative was discussed at talks in Miami involving representatives of Washington, Kyiv and European countries. However, the European participants objected. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said that Russian assets frozen in Europe must remain under European control.
The Russian authorities turn to the courts
Russian President Vladimir Putin has called the possible seizure of the frozen reserves “robbery”. According to him, it would undermine confidence in the European financial system and make other countries worry about the safety of their money. The Bank of Russia also maintains that the reserves remain its property and cannot be used without its consent.
Moscow is now trying to recover the money through the courts. On 12 December 2025, the Bank of Russia filed a lawsuit against the Belgian depository Euroclear with the Arbitrazh Court of Moscow. The Central Bank sought around €200 billion in compensation for the blocking of its funds, securities and the income from them, including €181.5 billion in direct damages and €18.6 billion in lost profits. In May, the Moscow court granted the claim in full. However, this did not help recover the reserves: the Belgian depository did not recognise the jurisdiction of the Russian court and cited European sanctions.
In response, Euroclear turned to a court in Brussels to prevent enforcement of the Russian ruling. The depository argues that the Russian court has no jurisdiction over the dispute.
In parallel, the Bank of Russia began challenging the European sanctions before the General Court of the EU in Luxembourg. In February 2026, the Central Bank sought the annulment of the restrictions extending the blocking of its reserves. In the Russian side’s view, they violate the right to property and international rules on the protection of state assets.
And in September, the Central Bank filed another lawsuit – against new European rules that allow EU courts to obstruct the enforcement of Russian court rulings outside the European Union.
Calculation or politics?
Experts disagree on what using the Russian reserves would mean for Europe. A confiscation of state assets on this scale has no historical precedent.
Creon Butler, an economist at the British think tank Chatham House, warned that confiscation could prove costly for Western countries. Investors could lose confidence in European and American government bonds, and governments would then have to borrow at higher interest rates. By Butler’s calculation, even a 5 basis point rise in rates would cost the G7 countries an additional $30 billion a year.
Karel Lannoo, head of the Brussels-based Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS), and economist Judith Arnal ask who would pay the money back if sanctions against Russia were lifted. In that case, Euroclear could face a claim to pay out around €200 billion, which by then would already have gone to Ukraine. This is precisely what Belgium fears. Instead of a reparations loan, the researchers propose either borrowing in the name of the EU or issuing bonds backed by future income from the Russian reserves – around €4 billion a year. Even such a scheme, however, would require guarantees from European states: once sanctions are lifted, the income could stop, while the obligations would remain.
Researchers at the Kyiv School of Economics do not share concerns about the financial consequences of confiscation. First, they note that after Russia’s reserves were frozen, central banks in other countries did not start abandoning the dollar and the euro en masse. Second, seizing the assets could spare European governments the need to borrow an additional €230 billion or so to help Ukraine.
Pierre Klein, professor of international law at the Université libre de Bruxelles, goes further and believes that there are no serious legal obstacles to seizing the Russian reserves. In his view, references to legal complications often serve merely as a pretext, and the decision to use the assets is above all a political one.
Official Russian and Belarusian sources cited in this text are for informational purposes only. Content from these sources may constitute disinformation or propaganda.
