Belgium expects to be able to support Ukraine with 2.3 billion euros in taxes that the country levies on frozen Russian assets. The money is intended, among other things, for the purchase of military equipment, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said during a visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
This concerns taxes on the interest generated by the assets frozen in Belgium. The European Union has frozen more than 200 billion euros in assets of the Russian central bank, of which around 125 billion euros are tied up with the Belgian transaction clearer Euroclear.
Belgium expects to raise 625 million euros in taxes this year and 1.7 billion euros next year. “Last year it became clear that 100 percent of the taxes on the proceeds of these assets should go to the Ukrainian people,” De Croo said. According to him, in addition to military expenditure, the money is also intended for humanitarian aid.
After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Western countries froze 300 billion euros in assets of the Russian central bank. Kyiv called for all that money to be used for the reconstruction of Ukraine, but simply taking other people’s money went too far for the G7 and the European Union. Taxing interest on large sums of money would be possible. The European Commission has been working on plans for this for months.
De Croo said that the Belgian tax law already offers the opportunity to raise money in this way for the Ukrainian fight against Russia. He calls on other EU countries to follow Belgium’s example.
Source: ANP
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