BRICS ministers meet in push to establish group as counterweight to West

Foreign ministers from the BRICS countries [Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa] are meeting in South Africa from June 1 as the five-nation bloc seeks to forge itself into a counterweight to Western geopolitical dominance in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

The talks are a prelude to an August summit in Johannesburg that has already created controversy because of the possible attendance of Russian President Vladimir Putin, the target of an International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant, according to Reuters.

It accused him in March of the war crime of forcibly deporting children from Russian-occupied territory in Ukraine. Moscow denies the allegations. South Africa had already invited Putin in January.

South African authorities confirmed that foreign ministers from Brazil, Russia, India, and South Africa are attending Thursday's meeting in Cape Town. A deputy minister is representing China.

No agenda has been made public, but analysts said discussions would aim to deepen ties among existing members and consider an expansion of the group.

"BRICS is positioning itself as an alternative to the West and as a way to make space for emerging powers," said Cobus van Staden of the South African Institute of International Affairs.

Once viewed as a loose, largely symbolic association of disparate emerging economies, BRICS has in recent years taken a more concrete shape, driven initially by Beijing and, since the start of the Ukraine war in February 2022, with added impetus from Moscow.

Discussions of BRICS' New Development Bank, which stopped funding projects in Russia to comply with sanctions, were expected on June 1, a South African foreign ministry source said.