BRICS leaders are to meet in Rio de Janeiro from today, with the bloc depleted by the absence of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), who is skipping the annual summit of emerging economies for the first time in 12 years.
The grouping meets as its members face imminent and costly tariff wars with the US.
Conceived two decades ago as a forum for fast-growing economies, the BRICS have come to be dominated by Beijing, which grew much faster and larger than the rest.
Photo: AFP
China has not said why Xi would miss the summit, a first since he became president in 2013.
“I expect there will be speculation about the reasons for Xi’s absence,” said Ryan Hass, a former China director at the US National Security Council who is now with the Brookings Institution think tank.
“The simplest explanation may hold the most explanatory power. Xi recently hosted Lula in Beijing,” Has said.
The Chinese leader would not be the only notable absentee. War crime-indicted Russian President Vladimir Putin is also opting to stay away, but would participate via video link, according to the Kremlin.
So too would Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, whose nation is still reeling from a 12-day conflict with Israel.
Putin’s non-attendance and the fact that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is to be a guest of honor in Brazil could also be factors in Xi’s absence, Hass said.
“Xi does not want to appear upstaged by Modi,” who would receive a state lunch, he said. “I expect Xi’s decision to delegate attendance to [Chinese] Premier Li [Qiang, 李強] rests amidst these factors.”
Still, the Xi no-show is a blow to host Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who wants Brazil to play a bigger role on the world stage.
In the year to November, Brazil would have hosted a G20 summit, a BRICS summit, and COP30 international climate talks, all before heading into fiercely contested presidential elections next year.
Lula is expected to run again for an unprecedented fourth term in office.
For BRICS leaders who do make the trip to the cidade maravilhosa — the marvelous city — the economy would be top of the agenda.
Lula on Friday defended the idea of finding an alternative to the dollar for trade among BRICS nations.
“I know it is complicated. There are political problems,” Lula said at a BRICS banking event. “But if we do not find a new formula, we are going to finish the 21st century the way we started the 20th.”
However, with many, including China, locked in difficult trade negotiations with the US, they might be wary of roiling the mercurial US president.
US President Donald Trump has warned that starting tomorrow, countries would receive letters stating the amount their exports to the US would be tariffed.
He has also threatened to impose 100 percent tariffs on countries that challenge the US dollar’s international dominance.
“We’re anticipating a summit with a cautious tone: it will be difficult to mention the United States by name in the final declaration,” said Marta Fernandez, director of the BRICS Policy Center at Rio’s Pontifical Catholic University.
This is particularly the case for China, she said: “This doesn’t seem to be the right time to provoke further friction” between the world’s two leading economies.
An American scientist convicted of lying to US authorities about payments from China while he was at Harvard University has rebuilt his research lab in Shenzhen, China, to pursue technology the Chinese government has identified as a national priority: embedding electronics into the human brain. Charles Lieber, 67, is among the world’s leading researchers in brain-computer interfaces. The technology has shown promise in treating conditions such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and restoring movement in paralyzed people. It also has potential military applications: Scientists at the Chinese People’s Liberation Army have investigated brain interfaces as a way to engineer super soldiers by boosting
Jailed media entrepreneur Jimmy Lai (黎智英) has been awarded Deutsche Welle’s (DW) freedom of speech award for his contribution to Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement. The German public broadcaster on Thursday said Lai would be presented in absentia with the 12th iteration of the award on June 23 at the DW Global Media Forum in Bonn. Deutsche Welle director-general Barbara Massing praised the 78-year-old founder of the now-shuttered news outlet Apple Daily for standing “unwaveringly for press freedom in Hong Kong at great personal risk.” “With Apple Daily, he gave journalists a platform for free reporting and a voice to the democracy movement in
PHILIPPINE COMMITTEE: The head of the committee that made the decision said: ‘If there is nothing to hide, there is no reason to hide, there is no reason to obstruct’ A Philippine congressional committee on Wednesday ruled that there was “probable cause” to impeach Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte after hearing allegations of unexplained wealth, misuse of state funds and threats to have the president assassinated. The unanimous decision of the 53-member committee in the Philippine House of Representatives sends the two impeachment complaints to deliberations and voting by the entire lower chamber, which has more than 300 lawmakers. The complaints centered on Duterte’s alleged illegal use and mishandling of intelligence funds from the vice president’s office, and from her time as education secretary under Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Duterte and the
As evening falls in Fiji’s capital, a steady stream of people approaches a makeshift clinic that is a first line of defense against one of the world’s fastest-growing HIV epidemics. In the South Pacific nation — a popular tourist destination of just under a million people — more than 2,000 new HIV cases were recorded last year, a 26 percent increase from 2024. The government has declared an HIV outbreak and described it as a national crisis. “It’s spreading like wildfire,” said Siteri Dinawai, 46, who came to be tested. The Moonlight Clinic, a converted minibus parked in a suburban cul-de-sac in Suva, is
RSS