EU’s Borrell Says Bloc Wants to 'Weaken Russian War Machine', Not Fight Moscow Directly

On Monday, the European Union’s foreign policy chief suggested that bloc members should seize whatever Russian assets they have trapped in their banks and spend the money on “rebuilding” Ukraine. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov slammed the proposal as brazen “theft” which Western leaders are “not even trying to hide” anymore.

Brussels would like to “weaken the Russian war machine” in Ukraine, but does not want a direct confrontation with Moscow, the EU's high representative for foreign affairs, Josep Borrell, has said.

“We are saying that we’re not taking part in the conflict, but we’re taking sides. We want to weaken the Russian war machine. We want to weaken the ability of [Vladimir] Putin and his regime to baselessly attack a sovereign country. We want to help Ukraine defend itself. But we don’t want to go to war with Russia”, Borrell told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper in an interview.

Borrell stressed that the EU must “do more” to make that happen, including by supplying Ukraine with more weapons, weakening the Russian economy, and “isolating” Moscow internationally.

The diplomat stressed that he “didn’t understand” people who say “that the more weapons you supply to Ukraine, the longer the war will last and the greater the suffering of Ukrainians will be…I ask these people: Doesn’t it matter how this war ends? Should the Ukrainians get on their knees and be torn to pieces by the Russians?...You see, wars end in negotiations. But you have to come to the negotiating table from a position of strength, and the task now is to put the Ukrainians in that position”.

On Tuesday, commenting on Borrell’s statements about seizing Russian assets trapped in European countries, and his earlier expressed sentiments that the Ukraine conflict will “be won on the battlefield”, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov reminded his counterpart that he was the bloc’s “top diplomat, not the European Union’s military leader”.

Last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin emphasised that the policy of trying to "contain and weaken" Russia was a long-term strategy by the West. Speaking to UN Chief Antonio Guterres on 26 April, the Russian president said Moscow has not given up hope on reaching a diplomatic resolution to the Ukraine crisis, notwithstanding efforts by Kiev to sabotage these negotiations.

Russian negotiators have indicated that Moscow’s requirements include guarantees of Ukrainian neutrality and non-bloc status, as well as Kiev’s recognition of Crimea’s status as part of Russia, and the Donbass People’s Republics’ status as sovereign nations.