< p>Estonia plans to become the first European Union country to legalize the confiscation of Kremlin-linked assets to finance the reconstruction of Ukraine in 2023.
This was stated by Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna, Bloomberg reported.
According to him, this move will “really hit” across Russia. Tsahkna noted that the Estonian government will approve the bill within two weeks before sending it to parliament.
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Estonia is pushing the 27-member bloc to move forward with a pan-European plan as it resolves the legal complexities of confiscating Russia's sanctioned assets .
— This will really hit the oligarchs — this will really hit the Russian state, — Tsahkna said.
He added that the bill would inevitably lead to Russian lawsuits.
In light of the freezing of some €200 billion in Russian central bank assets, some European leaders called for part of these funds to be used to restore Ukraine.
The Estonian initiative, which has been in development since December 2022, could affect about €35 million of sanctioned financial assets owned by Russian enterprises in Estonia.
According Estonian scheme, the international register of losses of Ukraine will be used as the basis for the expropriation of sanctioned assets.
According to Tsahkn, the development of the initiative in accordance with EU law was complicated by strict guarantees of private property in Estonia.
