gain for both sides from closer cooperation." On 8 October 2021, Borrell said the EU's relations with Turkey has significantly improved and he called his relationship with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan "excellent". On 18 October 2021, Borrell argued that the 2021 global energy crisis had "deep geopolitical roots. ... the price of gas, the scarcity, is something that has to be looked at from a geopolitical perspective." In December 2021, he criticised EU member states for not imposing sanctions on Ethiopia, which was accused of war crimes during the Tigray War. Borrell said the situation in Ethiopia was "one of my biggest frustrations" of the year because the EU was not able to react properly to the large-scale human rights violations, "mass rapes using sexual violence as a war arm, killings and concentration camps based on ethnic belonging." On 22 February 2022, after Russia recognised the breakaway Donetsk People's Republic and Lugansk People's Republic and subsequently sent troops into the two regions, Borrell issued a statement condemning the actions and called upon Russia to return to the tenets of the Normandy Format. Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, Borrell and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen were part of an EU delegation visiting Kyiv on 8 April. Borrell said he wants EU countries to confiscate frozen foreign-exchange reserves of the Russian central bank—which amount to over $300 billion—to cover the costs of rebuilding Ukraine after the war. On October 13, 2022, when speaking at the European Diplomatic Academy's inauguration ceremony in Bruges, Belgium, Borrell declared that "Europe is a garden and the rest of the world is a jungle." He added that the garden could be invaded by the jungle and that the gardeners would need to travel there in order to defend it. On October 18, in response to his comments, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the United Arab Emirates summoned the acting head of the EU mission at UAE to explain Borrell's remarks, stating that the remarks were "inappropriate and discriminatory" and "contribute to a worsening climate of intolerance and discrimination worldwide." Other positions Corporate boards Abengoa, member of the board of directors (2009–2016) Non-profit organizations Instituto Cervantes, ex officio member of the board of trustees (since 2018) European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed), member of the board European Movement International, member of the board of trustees Fundación Focus, member of the