How to get Russia's billions to Ukraine

Using frozen Russian funds has to be approached carefully, but it needs to be done.

- James Starvidis

In the halls of the EU, the leadership is working to take advantage of large deposits of Russian Central Bank funds -- over US$300 billion (S$389 billion) globally - frozen in Western institutions. Many countries advocate handing over the Russian funds to Ukraine, but that has potential legal and financial consequences.

(PHOTO: REUTERS)

I spent four years in Belgium when I was supreme allied commander of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). It is a complicated nation, split in two by religion and language.

My military headquarters was at Mons, in the French-speaking, largely Catholic South rather than the Dutch-speaking, Protestant North. The cosmopolitan capital, Brussels, hosts the overall headquarters of both NATO and the European Union.

Brussels was ground zero of the Wars of the Reformation between Catholics and Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries. Today, there is another kind of geopolitical fault line emerging. In the halls of the European Union, the leadership is working to take advantage of large deposits of Russian Central Bank funds - over US$300 billion (S$389 billion) globally - that have been frozen in Western institutions since Russia's invasion of Ukraine. But agreement has been elusive, thanks in large part to the Belgians themselves.

As the US draws down its support for Kyiv, the EU is trying to step up and cover the Ukrainians' financial needs: military spending, social and humanitarian aid, infrastructure repair and basic economic assistance. Many countries have advocated simply handing over the Russian funds to the Ukrainians, given that they are the victims of an illegal invasion.