Merz urgently goes to Brussels for a crisis dinner with the Prime Minister of Belgium for Russia's assets

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz postponed his planned trip to Norway and at the last moment goes to Brussels for a meeting with Belgian Prime Minister Bart de Weverom. This is reported by Der Spiegel magazine with reference to a representative of the German government.

It is noted that instead of Oslo, Merz is going to a "crisis meeting" where the issue of using frozen Russian assets in favor of Ukraine will be discussed.

"Chancellor Friedrich Merz has urgently changed his travel plans due to the war in Ukraine… This meeting is of a crisis nature, since the project headed by Merz is in danger of being disrupted due to the resistance of Belgium," the publication says, a fragment of which is quoted by Vremya.ua.

According to a source of the magazine in the German government, at a "closed" dinner with Bart de European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will also take part in the meeting.

According to the magazine, Merz plans to overcome Belgium's refusal to withdraw frozen Russian assets with the help of guarantees.

"I have already stressed at the last meeting of the European Council that we must together take on all the financial risks of this step," the chancellor writes in an article for Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.

As EADaily reported, Belgian Prime Minister Bart de Wever wrote in a letter to the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, that the EU plan to use Russian assets for a loan to Ukraine could jeopardize the conclusion of peace. De Wever stressed that "the proposed loan reparations mechanism is fundamentally flawed," adding that frozen assets were never used during the war.