MOSCOW, March 13. /TASS/. France is involved in outright theft of Russian assets for the sake of pouring weapons into Ukraine and continuing the conflict, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told a briefing.
"France’s actions [on appropriation of Russian assets] starkly point to the fact that it is not interested in a long-term settlement of the crisis around Ukraine, planning to continue pouring weapons into the Kiev regime, creating conditions for continuation of the conflict," she said.
Zakharova emphasized that Russia’s position on attempts "to illegally seize, or simply steal" Russian assets that are "frozen" on the territory of the European Union (EU) as part of unlawful restrictive measures, remains unchanged: "All frozen Russian assets and the corresponding revenues are the property of the Russian Federation. Seizing revenues from financial transactions carried out using our reserve funds without the appropriate consent from the Russian side is theft, no matter what pseudo-legal terminology it is disguised with."
The argument that occasionally appears in European media, stating that "the transactions on appropriation of extra revenues were not stipulated by present agreements, which is why they are allegedly legal, doesn't stand up to scrutiny," she highlighted.
"Such unilateral actions are the expropriation of a sovereign nation’s property for the purpose of personal gain. They set a blatant international precedent and irreversibly undermine the EU’s financial system in the eyes of the global community and, of course, global investors," Zakharova concluded.