Europe to fund Ukraine weapons with profits from frozen Russian assets

Ian Bond, a foreign policy analyst and Russia specialist at the Centre for European Reform, said Brussels could go further. "What the EU is talking about is not seizing the principal - but using the interest [from frozen Russian assets], which might amount to seven or $8 billion a year and using that for the benefit of Ukraine," Bond told VOA.

"It’s a worthwhile sum of money, but it is a tiny sum of money compared to the amount of damage that Russia has done to Ukraine and the amount of money that Ukraine needs to keep its government services and its war effort going."

...Those companies may find little sympathy in the West, suggests analyst Ian Bond.

"My view on that is these companies have had two years to get out of the Russian market. If they stayed in, it was because they thought it was okay to continue to earn money in Russia, despite the fact that it was waging a brutal war of aggression against one of its neighbors. And if they lose their shirts now, that's their tough luck," he said.

"There are European assets in Russia that the Russian government could seize. And it has in some cases already seized the assets of Western private companies in Russia. But I don’t think that the amounts would match up," Bond added.