Paris to use frozen funds to buy artillery shells and air defense equipment for kyiv
France has announced that it will use part of the proceeds from the freezing of Russian assets to finance the purchase of weapons for Ukraine. The move comes after kyiv asked Paris to speed up its arms deliveries.
Western countries have frozen $300 billion in Russian assets in response to Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine. While kyiv and some of its backers in Europe have repeatedly called for the confiscation of these funds, the EU has yet to find a legal way to do so.
However, the European Commission agreed in June to make available 1.5 billion euros ($1.6 billion) of Russian assets to aid Ukraine.
“The European Commission has agreed with the French Directorate General for Armaments to use these funds to rapidly acquire priority ammunition, artillery and air defense equipment for Ukraine from French industry worth €300 million ($332 million) by 2024,” the French Ministry of the Armed Forces said in a statement on Friday.
“This is an opportunity to continue the growth of French industry in favour of Ukraine,” the statement was read.
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Western governments are in a crisis of their own making
Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky this month urged France, Britain and the United States to speed up arms deliveries as kyiv’s forces are unable to contain the Russian military’s steady advance in Donbass. “Decisions are needed, as are timely logistics for the aid programs announced,” he said.
Moscow has insisted that freezing its foreign assets is illegal under international law and amounts to theft. “An inevitable response would be extremely damaging to Brussels,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said this in June.
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