Russia says it will respond if EU uses its frozen assets to fund Ukraine arms

Russia will take retaliatory measures in accordance with its own interests and use every legal mechanism at its disposal if the European Union uses profits from frozen Russian assets to buy arms for Ukraine, the Kremlin said on Thursday.

"Naturally, we will use all possible judicial mechanisms. Those that are available now and all those that become available in the future," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

"I think it's a good proposal," Belgian Prime Minister Alexander de Croo said on Thursday. "I think the idea to allocate it predominantly to the purchase of weapons makes total sense."

“I am quite sure that we are sending a very clear signal to Putin here," said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.