On January 23 at 11:00 am Moscow Time, the Valdai Club hosted an expert discussion, titled “From Freezing to Confiscation: Risks for Russian Assets in the West”.
After the start of Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine, Western countries froze the assets of Russian public and private entities that had been subject to blocking financial sanctions. At the same time, the possibility of confiscating these assets with the subsequent transfer of the funds received to Ukraine was discussed. So far, only Canada has such a legal mechanism. It will also be the first country to implement the idea of confiscation in practice. The Canadian experience could be adopted by other Western countries. In the United States, work on such a mechanism was announced back in April 2022. In the EU, a similar mechanism is also being developed, but its final form hasn’t been introduced in the form of new legislation.
Will the confiscation of Russian property in the West become widespread? Will Russia take equivalent retaliatory measures? How will the practice of applying sanctions change in the future? Participants of the expert discussion answered these and other questions.
Working languages: Russian, English.