BRICS SUMMIT/WAR IN UKRAINE: August 25, 2023

  • The BRICS bloc of top emerging economies have taken a major step in expanding its reach and influence with the announcement that six more nations have been invited join as new members. Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have been invited to join as full members from January 1 next year.

  • Several other countries said they want to join the BRICS bloc, including Zimbabwe, which just held elections.

  • The UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, who seemed like an outlier at the BRICS Summit amid a stream of speeches blasting western hegemony, delivered a stern warning the the leaders: “I have come to the BRICS Summit with a simple message: in a fracturing world overwhelmed by crises, there is simply no alternative to cooperation. As we move towards a multipolar world, we must urgently restore trust & reinvigorate multilateralism for the 21st century.” He also said it’s time for Africa to have a seat at the UN Security Council.

  • Press TV of Iran reported that with the addition of 6 new countries to the BRICS bloc, starting from January 1st, 2024, the combined economic power of the member nations will reach unprecedented heights, accounting for 30% of the entire global economy. BRICS 11 countries are expected to produce 36,554,318 barrels of oil per day, which is 45% of the world’s oil production. This is more than OPEC’s 30,744,834 barrels per day, the outlet claimed.

  • Yesterday, Ukraine marked the country’s Independence Day with a “special operation” in the occupied Crimean peninsula, where its troops briefly landed overnight. The defence ministry said all objectives were achieved without any casualties. However, “the enemy suffered losses” during a firefight in Olenivka and Mayak, western Crimea, it said. The intelligence department of Ukraine's defence ministry posted a video purportedly showing Ukrainian soldiers raising the national flag - BBC

  • Russia said it has thwarted a massive wave of drone attacks on occupied Crimea and a missile strike on Kaluga as Ukraine's military reported deadly air and drone strikes on its regions. Russia's Defense Ministry said on August 25 in a statement that its air defense neutralized 42 drones, nine of which were allegedly shot down while the other 33 were "suppressed by electronic means and crashed without reaching their target."

  • Vladimir Putin confirms Yevgeny Prigozhin died when the Wagner founder's plane crashed. " I knew Prigozhin for a long time, from the early 1990s. He had a difficult path and made serious mistakes in his life. But he got results – for himself, and when I asked him."

  • The Russian ministry also said a Ukrainian missile was downed in Kaluga, a region just southwest of Moscow, while Russian Telegram channels reported blasts in the sky above the Kaluga, Tula, and Moscow regions, likely caused by antiaircraft fire.Telegram channel Baza reported that the missile was shot down near the Shaikovka military airfield in Kaluga region, some 300 kilometers southwest of Moscow. Two major Moscow airports, Vnukovo and Domodedovo, temporarily ceased operations, Russian TASS reported - RFE/RL


Required reading…

BRICS is doubling its membership. Is the bloc a new rival for the G7?  

By Atlantic Council experts

On the ground in Johannesburg, Putin’s absence stuck out

Wednesday had delegates at the BRICS Summit—the first to be held in person since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic—here in Johannesburg looking up and down. With a proud Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi present, they applauded the landing of the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft on the moon. And hours later, news broke of the crash of a private jet in Russia said to be carrying Wagner Group boss Yevgeniy Progozhin and his deputy.

While Russian President Vladimir Putin’s absence stuck out like a sore thumb, not to be outdone by the India lunar fest and Xi showering host country South Africa with money, he managed to steal the news cycle by neutralizing a main opponent just as leaders were sitting down to dinner yesterday. One wonders if any of them had food tasters present.

Fireworks aside, the summit managed to generate headlines on Thursday with an expansion that would more than double the group’s membership. Saudi Arabia and the UAE will be appreciated for their financial heft and ability to inject cash into the New Development Bank, the bloc’s lending facility. The expansion also furthers Saudi leaders’ efforts to become a global heavyweight and powerwash their image after the ghastly 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The admittance of Argentina, Egypt, and Ethiopia gives South America and Africa more representation. Iran’s membership helps burnish BRICS’s image as an all-inclusive club—one that lets in countries no matter how appalling their human rights record. Indonesia was expected to join, but is said to have asked for more time to prepare.

Over the longer term, BRICS leaders have pledged to sort out intra-African trade. Trade among African countries makes up only 14.4 percent of African exports, and there’s a push to get that to increase by facilitating trade between countries in their own respective currencies. For instance, if Kenya wants to trade with Djibouti, why does a third currency like the US dollar have to be involved? If BRICS can sort that out in a continent that uses more than forty different currencies, it will be a major achievement. 

Finally, with the G7, G20, and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation degenerating into boxing rings for tantrum diplomacy, where final communiques either get watered down or not issued at all, perhaps it is worth giving BRICS a chance to reinvent multilateral cooperation. This reinvention cannot come soon enough—especially for poorer countries who need help the most.

Michael Bociurkiw is a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center. He is in Johannesburg, South Africa, for the BRICS Summit.

Read the thoughts and analysis of all the experts here

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