Shadow of Ukraine war hangs over Putin’s Brics summit in Russia
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Mr Vladimir Putin was peppered with questions by Brics reporters about the prospects for a ceasefire in Ukraine.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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KAZAN, Russia - Russia wants the Brics summit to showcase the rising clout of the non-Western world, but its partners from China, India, Brazil and the Arab world are urging President Vladimir Putin to find a way to end the war in Ukraine.
The Brics group now accounts for 45 per cent of the world’s population and 35 per cent of its economy, based on purchasing power parity, though China accounts for more than half of its economic might.
Mr Putin, who is cast by the West as a war criminal, told reporters from Brics nations that “Brics does not put itself into opposition to anyone”, and that the shift in the drivers of global growth was simply a fact.
He said: “This is an association of states that work together based on common values, a common vision of development and, most importantly, the principle of taking into account each other’s interests.”
The Brics summit
Mr Puti
Putin says he will not give up seized parts of Ukraine
Mr Putin’s answer was, in short, that Moscow would not trade away the four regions of eastern Ukraine it says are now part of Russia, even though parts of them remain outside its control, and that it wanted its long-term security interests taken into account in Europe.
Two Russian sources said that while there was increasing talk in Moscow of a possible ceasefire agreement, there was nothing concrete yet – and that the world was awaiting the result of the US vote.
Russia, which is advancing, controls about one fifth of Ukraine, including Crimea which it seized and unilaterally annexed in 2014, about 80 per cent of the Donbas – a coal-and-steel zone comprising the Donetsk and Luhansk regions – and over 70 per cent of the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions.
Mr Putin said the West had now realised that Russia would be victorious, but added that he was open to talks based on draft ceasefire agreements reached in Istanbul in April 2022.
On the eve of the Brics summit, he met United Arab Emirates (UAE) President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan for informal talks that went on until midnight at his Novo-Ogaryovo residence outside Moscow.
Xi, Modi attending summit, injury keeps Lula away
Mr Putin has praised both Sheikh Mohammed and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who will not attend the summit in Kazan, for their mediation efforts over Ukraine.
“I assure you that we will continue to work in this direction,” Sheikh Mohammed told Mr Putin. “We are ready to make any efforts to resolve crises and in the interests of peace, in the interests of both sides.”
Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will attend, though Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva cancelled his trip following medical advice to temporarily avoid long-haul flights after a head injury at home that caused a minor brain haemorrhage.
The acronym Bric was coined in 2001 by then Goldman Sachs chief economist Jim O’Neill in a research paper that underlined the massive growth potential of Brazil, Russia, India and China this century.
Russia, India and China began to meet more formally, eventually adding Brazil, then South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the UAE. Saudi Arabia has yet to formally join.
Brics’ share of global gross domestic product is forecast to rise to 37 per cent by the end of this decade, while the share accounted for by the Group of Seven major Western economies will decline to about 28 per cent from 30 per cent in 2024, according to data from the International Monetary Fund.
Russia is seeking to convince Brics countries to build an alternative platform for international payments that would be immune to Western sanctions.
But divisions abound within Brics. China and India, the top purchasers of Russian oil, have difficult relations, while there is little love lost between Arab nations and Iran. REUTERS
