Csongor Gáll: If Brussels ultimately makes a decision on using Russian assets in the coming days, how far will that push back the possibility of a peace agreement, how far will it push back the possibility of peace?
This is a complicated legal situation, which I’ll explain in three sentences if I can manage. Up until now Russian assets have been frozen on the basis of a unanimous decision every six months by the Council – including Hungary. We’ve always opposed freezing these assets and opposed their use, but until now there’s been no talk about confiscating this money – only about the fate of the interest and other minor details. In any case, Hungary had the opportunity to state its position once every six months. We didn’t usually veto it, but the approval of all Member States was required for these Russian assets to remain frozen for another six months. This legal situation has been completely changed – in a completely unlawful manner, in my opinion. And it wasn’t changed at the level of prime ministers, but one level lower, at a council meeting. There they said that from now on there would be no need to decide on the freezing of assets every six months, and that it would be extended indefinitely. And, according to the lawyers, this decision can be made – completely unlawfully in my opinion – without unanimity, by referring to a certain Article 122 of the founding treaty. So the situation is that the question of whether or not to freeze the Russian assets, and for how long – over which Hungary previously had a veto right – can no longer be subject to our veto. This is “justice morte”, a clear violation of the law – there’s no doubt about it, and we’ll take legal action. That’s one question. The other question is, now that these assets have been frozen, what should happen to them? The legal situation is such that this afternoon, or this evening at 7 p.m., for such a decision a unanimous decision is required – unless they commit another open violation of the law and say that this decision can now be taken by a two-thirds qualified majority instead of unanimity, citing the same article. So while there’s a debate about Russian assets, there’s a question of war, Brussels is marching towards a new type of bureaucratic dictatorship, in which the Commission or one of the Council’s bodies is using simple decisions to take away rights that clearly belong to the nation states. So in the meantime, we’re also involved in the illegal process of constructing a federalist system. This is why I say that this will be a very complicated weekend – with war, assets, legality, and rule of law issues.
What can be done about this? First of all, we’re now looking for allies, gathering together those countries which believe that confiscating and expropriating Russian assets, as outlined in the Commission’s plans – taking the frozen assets from the Russians and giving them to Ukraine, which is at war with Russia – is nothing less than an open declaration of war. I don’t remember ever seeing anything like this, and I certainly don’t remember learning about it during my studies. I’ve seen victors take territory, population and assets from the vanquished at the end of a war, and we could talk about that. But for a party that’s not legally involved in the war, such as the European Union, to take the property of one party in the Russo–Ukrainian war and give it to the other party in the war, this can only be interpreted as a declaration of war – and I think the Russians will interpret it that way. The only question is what kind of response they’ll make. We have protected ourselves against economic reprisals. A few weeks ago I wrote a letter to the Russian president. I don’t know whether it was made public. I asked him whether, if the EU seized frozen Russian assets, there would be retaliatory measures, and whether the Russians would take into account who voted for this decision when deciding on retaliatory measures. I received a reply stating that strong countermeasures would be taken using all means available under international law, and that the position taken by each EU Member State would be taken into account. So we Hungarians have protected ourselves and made it clear, as I’m doing now, that Hungary will not support the seizure of foreign exchange reserves, frozen foreign exchange reserves, from any country – not just Russia. Hungary will never support this under any circumstances. What’s more, there’s another related but important issue here, because Hungary’s foreign exchange reserves are also kept in the same place as Russia’s. And if Russia’s reserves can be seized, what if they decide to seize Hungary’s as well? So I’ve already instructed the Minister of Finance and the Governor of the Central Bank that if this decision is made, they should immediately submit a proposal to the Government on how under such circumstances we should consider the safe placement of Hungary’s foreign exchange reserves. That’s how it is.
