Modi may attend BRICS summit online – media

If the reports are confirmed, the Indian leader would join Russian President Putin in participating in the group’s gathering virtually

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi may take part in the summit of BRICS nations in South Africa later this month by video link, Reuters has reported, citing courses in New Delhi. The Indian Foreign Ministry declined to comment, the agency noted. The meeting of heads of state of the bloc’s members – Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa – is scheduled to take place in Johannesburg on August 22-24. 

Rumors about Modi possibly not attending the gathering in person emerged in India last week. A day before, Economic Times also reported, citing sources, that the Indian government is “toying” with the idea of Modi participating remotely “considering the geopolitical developments that would see Russian President Vladimir Putin addressing the summit virtually.” According to the publication, no final decision has been reached yet and no official announcement has been made.   

Last month, Moscow announced that Putin would take part in the summit of BRICS leaders in South Africa via video link. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that the Russian leader’s contribution to the gathering would be “comprehensive” despite it being done remotely. Russia will be represented at the summit by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.  

The addition of new members to BRICS is expected to be one of the key issues on the agenda at the gathering after the five leaders agreed in principle at last year’s summit in China to expand the bloc. In the Beijing declaration, leaders supported “promoting discussions among BRICS members on the BRICS expansion process” and stressed the need to clarify the guiding principles, standards, criteria, and procedures for the expansion process.   

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The bloc was hoping to introduce a framework for admitting new members before the August gathering, and the issue had been taken up on various occasions, including at the BRICS foreign ministers’ meeting in Cape Town in June.

In July, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar agreed to “start the BRICS expansion process” in Jakarta, the Chinese outlet Global Times noted last month. South Africa, which is the current chair of BRICS, recently announced that 40 nations are interested in joining the bloc, of which 22 have formally expressed their intention.  

Meanwhile, Bloomberg reported last week that India and Brazil have been opposing a rapid expansion of the bloc, with New Delhi insisting on strict rules for the admission of new members. However, according to The Hindu Business Line, India is unlikely to create major hurdles for adding new members and may only insist that countries joining the bloc support reforming the UN Security Council, and loosely meet certain qualification criteria for emerging economies, the newspaper said on Wednesday, citing people close to the discussions.