MOSCOW, April 27. /TASS/. The refusal of the Belgian authorities to recognize the exchange of blocked assets of Russian and foreign investors will impede the process, though the work will continue, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
RBC business daily reported earlier citing the Ministry of Finance of Belgium that the country did not recognize the exchange of blocked assets in accordance with the decree by President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin No. 844.
When asked whether such decisions could impede the process, Peskov said: "Obviously. It will at least not facilitate the asset exchange." "Those are difficulties on the way of implementation of this plan, but we will continue our work," he added.
The EU, Canada, the US and Japan have frozen Russian assets in a total amount of around $300 bln. Roughly $5-6 bln of the assets are in the US, while the bulk of the funds are held by European depositories, particularly by the Belgium-based Euroclear international platform.
Earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree ‘On additional temporary measures of economic nature related to foreign stock trading’ for the purpose of exchange of frozen foreign assets. The decree sets forth the procedure for selling foreign securities held by Russian and foreign nationals, including from unfriendly countries, at the expense of funds actually frozen with such foreigners at Type "C" accounts. This refers so far to the asset swaps amounting up to 100,000 rubles ($1,100) per investor.