Despite the US House of Representatives approving $61 billion in aid to Ukraine, one can expect further diplomatic hurdles over bankrolling the rest of Kiev’s bills, wrote The Washington Post.
Despite the decision by the US House of Representatives to finally approve $61 billion in aid for Ukraine after months of deadlock, one can expect further diplomatic hurdles over bankrolling the rest of Kiev’s bills, The acknowledged.The issue of getting their hands on the illegally frozen Russian assets to further funnel them to the Kiev regime is going to be an uphill battle, the outlet predicted.US officials have been “pushing” disinclined European leaders and diplomats to use some of the seized Russian Central Bank reserves, the authors recalled. But no matter what options for repurposing the Russian assets are proposed, European leaders reportedly fear the detrimental consequences of such a move.Options proposed have ranged from seizing the assets outright to using windfall profits from the Russian investments to back a loan or bond offering. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is a fan of the latter option, telling journalists recently that „The first payments of these windfall profits, that we estimate in the first year around about 2.5 to 2 billion euros a year, might be accessible and can be invested and support Ukraine in the military needs it has.“But officials from the International Monetary Fund and World Bank have balked at confiscating the Russian assets, as the outcome of the annual spring meetings of the boards of governors of the two bodies hosted by Washington a few days ago clearly testifies.
