Ukraine - telling it as it is
See above my podcast with Jonathan Fink at Silicon Curtain.
For me the issues of debt relief for Ukraine and ensuring Ukraine receives the full $300 billion plus of Russian assets immobilised in Western jurisdictions cannot be separated.
I don’t think an early debt relief agreement is in the interests of Ukraine, Western taxpayers or Western creditors as it will weaken the push to secure immobilised Russian assets for Ukraine.
I try and make this case in this podcast.
For me Ukraine’s victory against Russia is a Western public good, and can only be assured by the allocation of immobilised Russian assets, in full to Ukraine.
Western governments have provided “financing assurances” to the IMF to cover its estimate of Ukraine’s financing needs to 2027 (which exclude the military needs and hence short change Ukraine). But in an age of populism these financing assurances are not worth the paper they are written on given the likelihood of Trump 2.0, and prospects of near term political change in Europe with European elections in May and given Orban, Fico and Wilders, et al.
Bill Browder has argued that allocating immobilised Russian assets to Ukraine will Trump - proof Ukraine’s financing. Hard to disagree - needs must.