Tusk calls on EU to aid Ukraine with frozen Russian assets
Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk has called on EU peers to use frozen Russian assets to aid Ukraine.
Tusk made the statement on the X platform on Thursday: "Enough talking, it’s time to act! 1. Let’s finance our aid for Ukraine from the Russian frozen assets. 2. Let’s strengthen air policing, the Baltic sentry and the EU borders with Russia. 3. Let’s swiftly adopt new fiscal rules to finance the EU security and defence. Now!"
At the Helsinki summit on January 13, the leaders of Germany, Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland, as well as Mark Rutte, the NATO head, announced the establishment of a new Baltic Sentry mission aimed at protecting critical infrastructure in the Baltic Sea and the Gulf of Finland using allied vessels, aircraft, and sea drones.
Following Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Western countries froze nearly half of Moscow's foreign exchange reserves, amounting to approximately EUR 300 billion. About EUR 200 billion are deposited in the EU.
The second tranche of revenue generated from frozen Russian assets, amounting to EUR 1.9 billion, will be paid to Ukraine in April, European Affairs Minister Adam Szlapka has recently announced to the European Parliament, where he represented the EU Council in connection with the Polish presidency. (PAP)
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