The EU leaders' meeting held in Brussels on October 23 (Reporter Zhang Binjai) has been heavily debated by EU member states over the refusal to use frozen Russian assets to provide loans to Ukraine and failed to agree.

The official documents adopted at the meeting showed that EU leaders reiterated their political, economic and military support for Ukraine, but the statement on financial assistance was significantly weaker than the previous draft text. The document requires the European Commission to "propose a financial support plan as soon as possible based on an assessment of Ukraine's financing needs" so that the issue can be considered again at the next EU summit.

The document also stated that Russian assets should continue to be frozen until the conflict in Ukraine ends and Russia "pay compensation" to Ukraine, subject to EU law.

European Commission President Von der Leyen proposed the establishment of a "compensation loan" mechanism in his "State of the Union Address" in September, which plans to provide loans totaling approximately 140 billion euros to Ukraine with frozen Russian assets as guarantees. The plan is supported by Germany, France and the Baltic countries, but Belgium and the European Central Bank are cautious about this and believe that the plan still poses significant risks in terms of international law and financial stability in the euro zone.

Belgian Prime Minister Dewey said before the summit that unless the EU met Belgium¡¯s ¡°reasonable demands¡±, he would ¡°do everything possible¡± to stop the program. He called on the 27 member states to ¡°share the risk fully¡± in the ¡°indemnity loan¡± scheme and ensure that other member states also bear joint financial responsibilities if the money is to be paid back to Russia in the future.

Hungarian Prime Minister Orban said in an interview with domestic media on the 23rd that Hungary does not support the use of the proceeds generated by Russia's frozen assets because Russia has warned that it will take retaliatory measures. In addition, if the EU confiscates Russia's frozen assets, no country will deposit its foreign exchange reserves in EU financial institutions in the future.

After the Ukraine crisis escalated in February 2022, Western countries froze about US $300 billion in Russia's overseas assets. Among them, the EU froze the assets of the Russian Central Bank worth about 200 billion euros. About 90% of the frozen Russian assets in the EU are controlled by the European Clearing Bank headquartered in Belgium.