Swiss Economy Minister Guy Parmelin has defended the country's government's "no" to Switzerland joining the international task force to track down Russian oligarchs' money. Joining was not in the country's interest, he told the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ).
"In an increasingly polarised world, Switzerland, as a neutral country, has an interest in maintaining a certain restraint," the Swiss People’s Party parliamentarian said in the written interview.
Parmelin warned that the work in the task force could increase pressure on Switzerland. "There could also be pressure within the body that Switzerland would have to take on, for example, those of the US in addition to the EU sanctions." Switzerland must retain its freedom of decision on this issue.
The Swiss government plans to vote on a motion on task force accession next week.
Diplomats from France, Italy, Germany, the USA, Canada, Japan and the UK had called on Switzerland in March to become more involved in the search for Russian money.
Earlier this year, ambassadors from the G7 countries sent a letter to the Swiss government asking it to join the REPO (Russian Elites, Proxies, and Oligarchs) taskforce, an international taskforce for implementing the sanctions on Russian oligarchs.
To date, Bern has declined to join.
It's quite obvious who's money is still handled by swiss banks.
I am somewhat unsure; it is absolutely true that Switzerland’s neutrality is very important (and could play an important part in resolving this conflict), but yes, they have little ethical issues with channeling money to and fro dubious regimes, including Putin’s. It’d be nice if they would tell all parties in a conflict that their money will have to go elsewhere until said conflict is resolved.
There are points in time where being "neutral" isn't actually neutral. If a country is committing atrocities and you keep doing business with them while everyone else is leveraging sanctions then you aren't neutral. You are complicit at that point to a certain extent.