Switzerland has said it was extending by a year a freeze on the assets of ousted Presidents Zine El Abidine Ben Ali of Tunisia and Viktor Yanukovych of Ukraine. <br/><br/>A government statement read, the purpose of this decision is to support the judicial cooperation between Switzerland and these two states. In contrast, the Swiss said they were lifting a 2011 block on an initial 700 million dollar worth of assets in Egypt. That sum has dwindled by around half after Egyptian judicial agreements to drop criminal proceedings in the most prominent cases with possible links to assets frozen in Switzerland.<br/><br/>However, the funds will not be returned until Switzerland has completed investigations into their origin. In early 2011, Bern's Federal Council said it was freezing the assets of Ben Ali and his entourage as well as of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in the wake of the Arab Spring sweeping the region. A similar block followed when conflict-hit Ukraine in February 2014. The current freezes were to expire early next year.