Only six EU countries have frozen significant amounts of Russian assets.

Germany, France, Ireland, Austria, Belgium, and Luxembourg have frozen Russian assets totaling €13.9B. This is almost the entire amount of frozen Russian assets in the EU, according to a statement from the European Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders. It is noted that the rest of the EU countries have frozen Russian Federation assets in insignificant amounts or completely ignored this requirement. According to the European Commissioner, the problem lies in the insufficient exchange of information between countries. The EU is developing new rules that will simplify not only the freezing but also the seizure of assets. A potential key element of these rules is the introduction of criminal penalties for non-compliance with sanctions. The European Parliament has already supported this idea, but the member state governments must approve it in each individual EU country. Reinders assumes that the new rules will be adopted in October.