'Nobody's Money is Safe in the West' If Russia's Assets Used to Fund Ukraine

If the Biden administration gets away with illegally using seized Russian assets to fund Ukraine, that would “basically nuke the entire Western financial system," journalist Nebojsa Malic told Sputnik.

“I'm not exaggerating. If they're allowed to do this, then nobody's money is safe in the West. Period. Full stop. End of story," said the Serbian-American journalist. "And any country outside of the G-7 or NATO would be certifiably insane to hold any of its foreign currency, or reserves, or any assets in the West where it's accessible to the US and its allies. Because it is, it would not be safe. They could make up any pretext to confiscate it.”

As the West struggles to scrape together new aid packages for Kiev, the Biden administration has turned its eye on Russia’s foreign exchange reserves that were frozen by Western nations after the start of the conflict in Ukraine.

According to unnamed American and European officials quoted by The New York Times, Washington, in coordination with the G7, is now, "taking another look at whether it could sidestep congressional approval" to use the estimated $300 billion in funds.

Venezuela had its assets seized by the US and its Latin American and European allies including Britain, Nebojsa Malic recalled. Washington claimed at the time that it was transferring them to Juan Guido, the opposition leader that it recognized as the head of a government-in-exile based in the US, going as far as to evict the Venezuelan diplomatic mission from its embassy.

The US and other western countries refused to recognise the results of the 2018 presidential election in Venezuela, in which Nicolas Maduro secured an overwhelming victory for another term.

In practical terms, the measures meant that the government in Caracas could not access its gold reserves. It had been a “creative interpretation of laws and regulations,” said the journalist. However now, in the case of Russian assets, “this is this unprecedented next step.”

“This would basically be: 'we're confiscating your assets because we say so... And what are you going to do about it?'," Malic said, but "unfortunately for them, the rest of the world can do something about it, which is to immediately, or gradually, or with all applicable alacrity, withdraw their consent from the US financial market.”

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The journalist pointed out that the greenback is only the world's reserve currency because people buy US securities and that the rest of the world was essentially “underwriting” the massive US debt, estimated at $32 trillion. “That's the only reason that inflation in the US appears to be milder than it actually is,” explained the pundit.

“If the world stopped underwriting the Federal Reserve, the Americans would have to actually face the consequences of this rampant money printing that the government has been doing for 50 years now,” Malic noted.

Any attempt to take these frozen Russian assets and give them to Ukraine in some way, shape or form would just be “economic suicide.”

“I don't think enough people in Washington and out of Washington truly appreciate how dire this is. It will hurt Russia a little bit, but it would be absolutely disastrous for the US,” Malic warned.

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The journalist underlined the damage the backfiring anti-Russia sanctions concocted by the West had done to Europe already.

“It completely wrecked German industry, which was the only industry remaining on the continent worth mentioning," Malic stressed. "Clearly the people who are masterminding this policy have no understanding of economics and they clearly don't have any respect for law of any kind. So why would we trust them to actually know what they're doing?”

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There is very solid case that "open theft of assets would amount to an act of war," stated the journalist. He argued that the move may simply be a ruse to push Joe Biden’s huge supplementary funding bill through Congress.

The journalist said Washington had failed to think through the consequences of such actions. “They really need to realize that this is a stupid idea that will hurt the West far more than it would hurt Russia, that Moscow has already priced it in and calculated it into its policies, Malic said, adding:

“They want to try to help their own geopolitical interests and want to use Ukraine to bolster the American empire.”

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'Nobody's Money Safe in the West' If Russia's Assets Used to Fund Ukraine - Journo