Four keys to following the BRICS summit in South Africa

The group of emerging economies BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) will hold its XV Summit of Heads of State and Government next week in Johannesburg.

The summit will take place under the motto “BRICS and Africa: Partnership for mutually accelerated growth, sustainable development and inclusive multilateralism”. The keys to be able to follow the meeting are the following:

1. What are the BRICS?

Brazil, Russia, India and China created the BRIC group in 2006 and held their first summit in the Russian city of Yekaterinburg in 2009.

In 2010, South Africa joined the bloc by adding the letter S to the acronym, coined in 2001 by Goldman Sachs economist Jim O’Neil.

Although the BRICS were born to promote commercial and economic cooperation between them, their strength in recent times has led some experts to see the club as a challenge to Western hegemony in an increasingly multipolar world.

The group represents more than 42% of the world population and the 30% of the territory of the planet, as well as the 23% of the gross domestic product (GDP) and the 18% of global trade.

2. Where and when is the summit held?

South Africa, which holds the bloc’s rotating presidency this year, will host the event at the Sandton Convention Center, the financial heart of Johannesburg, from August 22 to 24.

This is the first face-to-face BRICS summit since 2019, a period in which these meetings were held by videoconference due to the covid-19 pandemic.

3. Who attends the summit?

The presidents of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva; China, Xi Jinping; and South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa; as well as Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will attend the conference.

However, Russian President Vladimir Putin will be absent due to the arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) against him for alleged war crimes in Ukraine, although he will intervene electronically and will be represented by his Minister of Affairs Foreign Affairs, Sergei Lavrov.

If Putin had set foot in Johannesburg, South Africa, as a member state of the ICC, was obliged to arrest him.

In addition, South Africa has invited 67 leaders from the Global South, including the presidents of Cuba, Miguel Díaz-Canel, and Bolivia, Luis Arce.

Twenty dignitaries from international organizations are also invited, such as the UN Secretary General, António Guterres, and the Chairman of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat.

4. What issues will be addressed?

Block expansion is expected to be the star theme. Some forty countries have expressed interest in joining that club, according to the South African government, which has received “formal expressions of interest from the leaders of 23 countries”including Argentina, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Bolivia, Cuba, Honduras, Venezuela, Algeria or Indonesia.

The bloc, which has yet to agree on admission criteria, is seeking more weight in international institutions, hitherto dominated by the United States and Europe.

The group is also expected to address the “de-dollarization” of their economies, that is, the promotion of local currencies to trade at the expense of the dollar, a position supported by the New Development Bank (NDB), established by the BRICS in 2015.

But, according to the South African organizers, the creation of a common currency for the BRICS, which Lula fervently defends, will not be put on the table.

In addition, world geopolitics, the relationship between the BRICS and Africa, trade and infrastructure development will be part of the discussions.

Source: EFE