BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany wants to work productively on ideas regarding the use of Russian assets frozen in the European Union, Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil said in Copenhagen on Friday, indicating an openness in Berlin towards the legally fraught issue.
“Everything must be carefully examined,” Klingbeil said ahead of talks with his EU counterparts.
“Germany will take on a role in which we want to make things possible and not one in which we block things,” he added.
Wary of seizing the assets, a red line for some in the EU, the bloc is discussing ways to use them more intensively to fund support for Ukraine amid uncertainty over the United States’ commitment to Kyiv under President Donald Trump.
So far, the EU has only taken interest generated from the assets, which were frozen after Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Germany has in the past repeatedly expressed legal concerns over any proposals to seize them completely.
Klingbeil said his coalition government was committed to pursuing more intensive use of the frozen assets, despite the legal difficulties.
“There is a financial need there. We want to fulfill our responsibility for Ukraine,” he told reporters.
(Reporting by Christian Kraemer, Writing by Friederike Heine, Editing by Miranda Murray)
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