This is the the third almost simultaneous meeting of world leaders synchronized with a NATO Foreign Ministers Summit in Oslo Norway and Members of the European Commission in Moldova ...looks like almost everything is happening almost everywhere all the time, huh?
Iran, Saudi Arabia, UAE attend BRICS meeting in South Africa, as bloc mulls expansion
Iran, which has applied for observer status in BRICS, is finessing non-Western states to remedy its battered economy.
Foreign ministers of BRICS nations pose for a group photo with representatives from Africa and the global South during a summit in Cape Town, South Africa, June 2, 2023. - India's foreign ministry
Iran, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates foreign ministers attended the BRICS meeting in South Africa this week, as the bloc seeks to expand its membership to counterbalance Western powers.
Iran's Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud and UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan attended the ministerial meeting of the BRICS nations on Thursday and held bilateral meetings on Friday.
Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Iran are not members of the bloc, which is currently comprised of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Iran submitted an application last year to join as an observer state.
Saudi Arabia is in discussions to join BRICS' lender bank, the New Development Bank, the Financial Times reported this week. Created in 2014, the bank is seen as a counterweight to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.
Prince Faisal held meetings with South African counterpart Naledi Pandor, as well as Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and India's Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.
Sheikh Abdullah also met with Jaishankar, Pandor and Lavrov. The UAE's top diplomat held a bilateral meeting with his Iranian counterpart as well.
On Friday, Pandor portrayed the bloc as a champion of the global South.
"The world has faltered in cooperation. Developed countries have never met their commitments to the developing world and are trying to shift all responsibility to the global South," Pandor said.
Upon his departure from Tehran, Amir-Abdollahian hailed BRICS as a body that represents half of the global population and called his visit an example of Iran's "active presence at international bodies" and a step in Iran's "balanced" foreign policy.
In a pre-recorded interview broadcast on state TV after his departure, Amir-Abdollahian said that a key topic on his agenda in Cape Town would be "de-dollarization" in trade with BRICS member states.
Iranian officials have been persistently pursuing that goal in their recent meetings with friendly states.
The country's Deputy Foreign Minister for Economic Affairs Mehdi Safari announced last month that the Islamic Republic has already proposed to member states of both BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization to designate a non-dollar currency for their trade ties "to neutralize the impacts of unilateral sanctions."
South Africa’s role as host of the BRICS summit is fraught with dangers. A guide to who is in the group, and why it exists
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South Africa will host the BRICS summit in August 2023. The event could offer the country an opportunity to exercise leadership in the BRICS’ efforts to reform the arrangements for global economic governance and in supporting sustainable and inclusive development in Africa and the Global South. However, the opportunity has morphed into an international challenge because Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, who has been indicted by the International Criminal Court, has indicated that he will attend. South Africa could face the wrath of its BRICS partners if it fulfils its international obligation and arrests him. On the other hand, if it does not arrest him, it could face sanctions from those countries that want to see Putin tried for war crimes.
Hosting the 2023 BRICS summit is therefore fraught with dangers. The international environment is complicated, dynamic and unpredictable. South Africa can avoid embarrassment and capitalise on the opportunities presented by the summit only if it is able to skilfully manoeuvre in these choppy waters.
Trying to understand South Africa’s dilemma raises a number of questions: Who are the BRICS? What has the grouping achieved?
Who are the BRICS?
In 2001, the global investment bank Goldman Sachs stated that it expected Brazil, Russia, India and China to become leading actors in the global economy. It collectively named the four countries “BRICs”.
Do experts have something to add to public debate?
These countries decided that Goldman Sachs had a point and that they could enhance their global influence if they cooperated. They first met at a ministerial level in 2006 and at a leaders’ summit in 2009. In 2010 they invited South Africa to join the group. The group became known as “BRICS”.
A primary objective of the group is to reform global economic governance so that it is more responsive to the concerns and interests of the Global South. For example, the BRICS have called for a new global currency that can challenge the dominant role of the US dollar in the international monetary system. It has also pushed for a greater voice – and more votes – for developing countries in key international economic organisations like the IMF and the World Bank.
The group has also sought, through groups like its business forum, to promote greater economic cooperation between the participating countries.
What has the BRICS grouping achieved?
The BRICS record of achievements is mixed.
In 2016, the group established two new international economic entities.
The first was the New Development Bank. They contend that it is a “new” multilateral development bank which offers its members an alternative to institutions like the World Bank. It claims that its governance is fairer than the World Bank because its five original members all have equal votes. At the World Bank, shares (and therefore votes) are unevenly distributed among member states.
The development bank also strives to provide financing more quickly than the World Bank, and in a way that is more respectful of the laws in its member states.
The second new entity was the Contingent Reserve Arrangement. This established a series of swap arrangements between the BRICS central banks. These arrangements allow each central bank, when its country is facing a balance of payments crisis, to exchange its local currency for hard currencies, like the US dollar, with its counterparts in the BRICS.
Pursuant to the terms of the arrangement, a central bank can only draw on a fraction of the available financing without also having to enter into a financing arrangement with the IMF. Thus, the conditions that are attached to the IMF’s finances also become applicable to the funds made available through the Contingent Reserve Arrangement.
To date, no BRICS central bank has used the arrangement.
According to their communiques, the BRICS leaders have agreed to create other entities, such as a vaccine centre and a new credit rating agency. However, they have not yet implemented these agreements.
They have not been successful either in reforming the existing institutions and arrangements for global economic governance, such as the IMF. One reason for this failure is the strong opposition to reform from states, primarily those in Europe, which currently have dominant voices in the IMF and would lose them in the case of true reform.
But another important reason is that the BRICS are not unified in their demands for reform. For example, while Brazil, India and South Africa support reforming the UN Security Council to include more permanent members and to eliminate the veto power of the existing permanent members, China and Russia, as sitting permanent members, don’t.
Similarly, not all the other BRICS have supported South Africa’s call for a third African seat on the IMF’s board of directors.
Are there any downsides to BRICS membership?
The global political and economic situation has changed dramatically since 2010. These changes have created both opportunities and challenges for the BRICS.
One opportunity arises from the fact that approximately 19 countries in the Global South, including Argentina, Cuba, Iran and Saudi Arabia, have expressed an interest in joining the BRICS. It is expected that the BRICS will consider the issue of membership at their upcoming August 2023 summit.
Another opportunity arises from the growing interest around the world in having an alternative currency to the US dollar as the basis for the international financial system. The BRICS have been vocal supporters of de-dollarisation. However, given the complex economic and political relations between the BRICS member states, there is considerable scepticism about the feasibility of the BRICS developing a new global currency in the near term.
The primary challenges facing the BRICS arise from geopolitics. The war in Ukraine has created tensions within the BRICS. The participating states have been forced to balance their respect for such international law principles as self-determination, sovereignty and peaceful resolution of disputes with their friendly relations with Russia. In addition, the BRICS cannot escape the fallout from the growing economic and security tensions between China and the west, particularly the US.
Both these issues complicate the efforts of the other BRICS to maintain their formal non-aligned position. They also exacerbate existing tensions within the BRICS. The most important example of this is the complex and tense relationship between India and China. In recent years, they have had military skirmishes in disputed border areas. In addition, India has imposed economic constraints on Chinese companies operating in India. The two countries have refused to renew the visas of journalists from each country so that now there are almost no journalists from Chinese publications in India and vice versa.
What hangs on the summit?
South Africa faces another opportunity that is fraught with danger when it hosts the G20 in 2025. The G20, which brings together the 20 leading economic powers in the world, has called itself the “premier forum” for global economic governance. South Africa is currently the only permanent African member of the G20 and 2025 will be the first time the group is hosted by an African country.
Planning for this G20 event must begin soon because in 2024 South Africa will join India, the current G20 host, and Brazil, the 2024 G20 host in the troika that manages the G20 process. If the country does not plan carefully and effectively for this G20 event, South Africa risks emerging with a diminished reputation and its credibility shredded.
BRICS ministers call for rebalancing of global order away from West
Published
IMAGE SOURCE,EPA
Image caption,
From left: Ma Zhaoxu, Mauro Vieira, Naledi Pandor, Sergei Lavrov and Subrahmanyam Jaishankar in Cape Town
By Oliver Slow
BBC News
A meeting of foreign ministers of the Brics group of nations in South Africa has called for a rebalancing of the global order away from Western nations.
South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor said the group's vision was to provide global leadership in a world fractured by geopolitical tension, inequality and global insecurity.
Brics is an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
Allegations of Russian war crimes in Ukraine have clouded the talks.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin over the allegations and, as a member of the court, South Africa would be obliged to arrest him if he attends a Brics summit scheduled for Johannesburg in August.
The Brics is seen by some as an alternative to the G7 group of developed nations, which held its annual summit in the Japanese city of Hiroshima last month, and was also attended by the leaders of Brazil and India. G7 members have been highly critical of Russia and China.
Brics countries have a combined population of more than 3.2 billion people, making up about 40% of the world's roughly 8 billion people.
On the first of two days of talks in Cape Town, Indian Minister of External Affairs Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said the gathering must "send out a strong message that the world is multipolar, that it is rebalancing and that old ways cannot address new situations".
"At the heart of the problems we face is economic concentration that leaves too many nations at the mercy of too few," he said.
Brazilian Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira described the Brics as an "indispensable mechanism for building a multipolar world order that reflects the devices and needs of developing countries".
Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Ma Zhaoxu said the Brics group could be expanded to provide assistance to developing countries and emerging market economies.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said "more than a dozen" countries including Saudi Arabia had expressed interest in joining the group.
His presence at the event was met with protests, with demonstrators holding a picture of Mr Lavrov with the words "child murderer".
One protester told AFP news agency it was difficult to see South African officials "shaking the hand of a person who is part of these systemic war crimes against Ukrainian children", a reference to the ICC case against Mr Putin.
South Africa's governing African National Congress (ANC) has long-standing ties with Russia that go back to the years of white-minority rule before 1994, and the country has refused to criticise Moscow's invasion of Ukraine.
IMAGE SOURCE,REUTERS
Image caption,
Russian President Vladimir Putin with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa at a summit in 2019
Earlier this week, a deputy minister told the BBC the country planned to change its laws so that it had the power to decide whether or not to arrest a leader wanted by the ICC.
At a news conference, Dr Pandor was asked by BBC correspondent Andrew Harding whether Mr Putin would be arrested if he came to the summit in August.
"The president [Cyril Ramaphosa] will indicate what the final position in South Africa is," she replied.
A senior official privately described the situation as a diplomatic nightmare from which the South African government was desperate to escape, and one option said to be under consideration is moving the summit to another country.."
BRICS Summit 2023 LIVE: South Africa Hosts Meeting of BRICS Foreign Ministers | BRICS FMs MeetSouth Africa hosts a meeting of the foreign ministers of BRICS ...
BRICS calls for order re-balancing away from the Western Nations · BRICS Summit 2023 LIVE: South Africa Hosts Meeting of BRICS Foreign Ministers | BRICS FMs Meet.
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BRICS ministers open to enlargement as Putin looms large
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Foreign ministers from the five-nation grouping of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa called for a "rebalancing" of the global order, as they met in Cape Town for a two-day conference overshadowed by the fallout from the war in Ukraine.
I have the honour to welcome you to Cape Town, South Africa, for our meeting as BRICS Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Friends of BRICS Foreign Ministers.
The Meeting of the BRICS Ministers of Foreign Affairs and International Relations, taking place today and tomorrow (1 – 2 June 2023) will be streamed live on the BRICSza Facebook and Twitter pages.
The Meeting of the BRICS Ministers of Foreign Affairs and International Relations, taking place today and tomorrow (1 – 2 June 2023) will be streamed live on the BRICSza Facebook and Twitter pages.
The Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) wishes to advise the media that they may collect accreditation cards at 12 Apostles Hotel and Spa, Cape Town
On 29 May 2023, the Department of International Relations and Cooperation issued a notice in the government gazette on Diplomatic Immunities and Privileges for the upcoming BRICS Foreign Ministers meeting in Cape Town and BRICS Summit to be held in Johannesburg in August.
The Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) wishes to advise the media that the collection of accreditation cards for the meeting.
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