(Bari) The G7 meeting in Italy calls on China to stop supplying weapons components to Russia at war with Ukraine, according to the draft final declaration consulted by AFP, which also promises to help Kyiv ” as long as necessary.”
“We call on China to stop transferring […] weapons components and equipment that supply the Russian defense sector,” demand the heads of state and government.
“We stand united in supporting Ukraine’s fight for its freedom and reconstruction for as long as necessary,” say the heads of state and government, who received Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday and promised him 50 billion dollars from income from frozen Russian assets.
This $50 billion loan for Kyiv will be guaranteed by future interest earned on fixed Russian assets, which amount to €300 billion generating up to three billion euros in revenue per year.
“In the presence of President Zelensky, we decided to make available approximately $50 billion leveraging extraordinary revenues from frozen Russian assets, which sends an unequivocal signal to [Russian] President Vladimir Putin,” the leaders say in their draft declaration.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday called the freezing of Russian assets in the West and their use to help Ukraine resist Russia “theft” and vowed to retaliate.
After advocating a pure and simple confiscation of Russian assets, legally risky, the United States agreed with the European position of using only the interest generated by the frozen assets.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, whose country holds the rotating presidency of the G7, was keen to emphasize on Thursday after the conclusion of the agreement: “We are not talking about the confiscation of these assets, but of the interests that accumulate in over time”.
The G7 affirms its “intention” to direct these “funds towards the military, budgetary and reconstruction needs of Ukraine, within the limits of our respective legal systems and administrative requirements.”
The frozen Russian assets are mainly in the European Union: around 185 billion euros were frozen by Euroclear, an international money depository established in Belgium. This gives preponderant weight to Europe over the use of Russian assets.
The rest is shared in particular between the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom and Switzerland.