"Unless and until Russia voluntarily pays full compensation, the compensation fund should primarily be funded through the seizure of Russian sovereign and private assets. State-owned assets can be denied the protection of immunity as a legitimate countermeasure taken against aggression. In this respect, the Assembly welcomes the resolution of the European Parliament adopted on 19 January 2023 accepting the possibility of “denying [Russian sovereign] assets the protections of sovereign immunity or limiting such protections owing to the gross nature of these violations". At the same time, private assets of oligarchs already under sanctions for supporting the Russian aggression could be confiscated in a non-conviction-based procedure where their contribution to the Russian aggression is duly proven and all their rights, including the right to property and to a fair trial, are duly respected. In this respect, the Assembly notes that a non-conviction-based procedure is recognised by the European Court of Human Rights to be compatible with human rights and has been successfully used by a number of countries, for instance by Italy to counter the mafia."
If the Council of Europe is determined to support Ukraine in its demand for just and full compensation, it should also support the only practicable way to ensure that victims of atrocities and genocides receive reparations in the near future.