According to officials with knowledge of the situation, India and Brazil are resisting Chinese efforts to quickly extend the BRICS group of developing markets in order to strengthen its political power and in order to counter US.
In preparatory talks for summit in Johannesburg next month, where Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa would perhaps explore expanding the group to include Indonesia and Saudi Arabia, the nations have objected against it.
The officials, who wanted not to be named because the conversations were confidential, claimed that China advocated for expansion on numerous occasions during those sessions.
Numerous other countries are also clamouring to join the alliance, feeding western worries that it is developing into a rival to Washington and the EU.
Due in part to these concerns, Brazil wants to avoid enlargement, and India wants rigorous guidelines on how and when other countries can join the organisation without formally expanding it. All decisions must be agreed upon by the members, who will meet from August 22–24.
According to the authorities, India and Brazil want to utilise the summit to discuss the possibility of adding other nations with observer status. Two of the officials indicated that while South Africa doesn’t inherently oppose growth, it does favour considering various membership alternatives to accommodate this.
“The BRICS leaders meeting last year authorized the expansion of membership, adding more members to BRICS is the political consensus of the five BRICS countries,” China’s foreign ministry said in a response to Bloomberg.
The gathering intends to highlight the bloc’s ambitions to become a significant political and economic power. The conference takes place after South Africa expressed concern over Russian President Vladimir Putin’s presence and amid rising tensions between Washington and Beijing. He will take part virtually in order to avoid South Africa issuing an arrest warrant for him from the International Criminal Court.
