A Group of Seven summit opened with an agreement reached on a proposal by the United States to back a $US50 billion ($75 blllion) loan to Ukraine using frozen Russian assets as collateral, giving Kyiv a strong show of support.
US President Joe Biden said on Thursday (Friday AEST) the agreement to tap into the windfall profits on some $422 billion in frozen Russian assets held in Europe would put that money to work for Ukraine.
“Another reminder to (Vladimir) Putin: We’re not backing down. In fact, we’re standing together against this illegal aggression,” Biden said at a news conference, with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy by his side.
The agreement was hashed out hours before Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni opened the summit at a luxury resort in southern Italy, saying she wanted the message of the meeting to be one of dialogue with the global south and unity.
The G7 includes Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States.
The US proposal involves engineering a $75 billion loan to help Ukraine in its fight against Russia that would use interest earned on profits from Russia’s frozen central bank assets, most of them held in the European Union, as collateral.
“It is a strong signal that we are sending to Ukraine that we will support Ukraine in its fight for freedom for as long as it takes,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
“It is also a strong signal to Putin that Putin cannot outlast us,” she said.
In other developments on the sidelines of the G7 meeting, Biden and Zelenskyy signed a 10-year security agreement that they hailed as a milestone in relations between their countries, but that alone was not enough to stop Zelenskyy from wondering how much longer he could count on America’s support.
Zelenskyy also said his country “urgently” needed additional air defence systems to protect Ukrainians and the nation’s infrastructure from Russia’s continued bombardment.
Biden said the goal “is to strengthen Ukraine’s defence and deterrence capabilities.”
