KAZAN, Russia: Two dozen world leaders are gathering in Russia on Tuesday for the opening of a summit of the BRICS group, an alliance of emerging economies that the Kremlin hopes will challenge Western “hegemony.”
The summit is the biggest such meeting in Russia since it ordered troops into Ukraine and comes as Russian President Vladimir Putin seeks to demonstrate that Western attempts to isolate Moscow over the two-and-a-half-year offensive have failed.
Chinese leader Xi Jinping, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan — all key partners for Russia — are scheduled to join the summit, hosted in the city of Kazan from October 22 to 24. Xi was en route to the meeting, Chinese state news agency Xinhua reported Tuesday.
Moscow has made expanding the BRICS group — an acronym for core members Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — a pillar of its foreign policy.
The main issues on the agenda include Putin’s idea for a BRICS-led payment system to rival SWIFT, an international financial network that Russian banks were cut off from in 2022, as well as the escalating conflict in the Middle East.
The Kremlin has touted the gathering as a diplomatic triumph that will help it build an alliance to challenge Western “hegemony.”
US-Moscow tensions
The United States has dismissed the idea that BRICS could become a “geopolitical rival” but has expressed concern about Moscow flexing its diplomatic muscle as the Ukraine conflict rages.
Moscow has been steadily advancing on the battlefield in eastern Ukraine this year while strengthening its ties with China, Iran and North Korea — three of Washington’s adversaries.
By gathering the BRICS group in Kazan, the Kremlin “aims to show that not only is Russia not isolated, it has partners and allies,” Moscow-based political analyst Konstantin Kalachev told AFP.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Putin in 2023 over the illegal deportation of children from Ukraine, and the Russian leader abandoned plans to attend the previous summit in ICC member South Africa.
This time round, the Kremlin wants to show an “alternative to Western pressure and that the multipolar world is a reality,” Kalachev said, referring to Moscow’s efforts to shift power away from the West to other regions.
The Kremlin has said it wants global affairs to be guided by international law, “not on rules that are set by individual states, namely the United States.”
“We believe that BRICS is a prototype of multipolarity, a structure uniting the Southern and Eastern hemispheres on the principles of sovereignty and respect for each other,” Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said.
“What BRICS is doing is gradually — brick by brick — building a bridge to a more democratic and just world order,” he added.
Attending delegates
In Kazan, Putin is set to meet individually with Modi and Xi, as well as the leaders of South Africa and Egypt on Tuesday, followed by separate talks with Erdogan and Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian on Wednesday.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres is also undertaking his first trip to Russia since April 2022 to attend the summit. He will sit down with Putin on Thursday, according to a program shared by Ushakov.
Ahead of the summit, AFP journalists in the city reported heightened security measures and a visible police presence.
The surrounding Tatarstan region, which is some 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) from the border with Ukraine, has previously been hit by long-range Ukrainian drone attacks.
Movement around the city center is being limited, residents advised to stay home, and university students moved out of dormitories, local media reported.
Russia-Ukraine war
The West believes Russia is using the BRICS group to expand its influence and promote its own narratives about the Ukraine conflict.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has warned other countries could feel emboldened if Putin wins on the battlefield in Ukraine.
Starting with four members when it was established in 2009, BRICS has since expanded to include several other emerging nations such as South Africa, Egypt and Iran.
But the group is also rife with internal divisions, including between key members India and China.
Turkiye, a NATO member with complex ties to both Moscow and the West, announced in early September that it also wanted to join the bloc.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva canceled his planned trip to the summit at the last minute after suffering a head injury that caused a minor brain haemorrhage.
Putin seeks to rival West with BRICS summit
https://arab.news/n4jzj
Putin seeks to rival West with BRICS summit
- Chinese leader Xi Jinping, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are scheduled to join the summit
- Moscow has made expanding the BRICS group a pillar of its foreign policy
Son of founder of modern Singapore says he is now a political refugee
- Singapore’s government says the persecution claim was baseless and unfounded
- Lee Hsien Yang said he had sought asylum protection in 2022, citing government persecution
In a Facebook post, Lee, the estranged brother of former premier Lee Hsien Loong, said Britain has determined he faces “a well-founded risk of persecution, and cannot safely return to Singapore.”
“I sought asylum protection as a last resort. I remain a Singapore citizen and hope that some day it will become safe to return home,” he said.
Singapore’s government said the persecution claim was baseless and unfounded, ChannelNewsAsia reported, citing a response it said was provided to the Guardian newspaper.
Britain’s high commission in Singapore did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Lee Hsien Yang and his sister Lee Wei Ling, who died on Oct. 9, have been at odds with their brother Lee Hsieng Loong, who was premier from 2004 until May this year, over what to do with their father’s home after his death in 2015, in a public spat that saw the siblings estranged.
Lee Hsien Yang said he had sought asylum protection in 2022, citing government persecution against him and his family, and that he was unable to return for his sister’s funeral as a result.
He had said last week that he would apply to demolish Lee Kuan Yew’s home in line with his father’s wishes.
The government said in response it would consider issues related to the property in due course.
Taiwan again rejects South African demand to move its representative office from Pretoria
- Demand to move or shut the office entirely violates a 1997 agreement between the sides
- South Africa maintains a liaison office in Taiwan’s capital, Taipei, and the sides have a strong commercial relationship
TAIPEI: Taiwan has again rejected South Africa’s demand that it move its representative office in the country from the capital, Pretoria, to the commercial center of Johannesburg.
Taiwan Foreign Ministry spokesperson Jeff Liu said at a news conference on Tuesday that the demand to move or shut the office entirely violated a 1997 agreement between the sides on the location of their mutual representative offices following the severing of formal diplomatic relations.
“Facing this kind of unreasonable demand, our side cannot grant our acceptance,” Liu said.
South Africa maintains a liaison office in Taiwan’s capital, Taipei, and the sides have a strong commercial relationship. Liu repeated Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung’s avowal at the legislature on Monday that Taiwan “was prepared for all eventualities” over the issue. The office is Taiwanese property and Taipei retains the right to determine its location and status, Lin and Liu said.
China, which claims Taiwan as its own territory that must be annexed by force if necessary, relentlessly seeks to minimize Taiwan’s international representation, although the self-governing island republic maintains robust unofficial relations with the US and other major nations.
South Africa confirmed last week that it had asked Taiwan to move its liaison office, in a demand seen purely as a concession to China, which has used its influence to keep Taiwan out of the United Nations and affiliated branches such as the World Health Organization, and limit its formal diplomatic partners to just 11 countries and the Vatican.
In addition to diplomatic and economic pressure, China has stepped up its military threats against Taiwan, most recently holding large-scale live-fire drills just off the Chinese coastal province of Fujian, which faces Taiwan.
South Africa’s demand that Taiwan move its office has also drawn attention in the US Congress, with Tennessee Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn posting on the social platform X that “the United States should not tolerate this behavior from South Africa.”
“I am calling on ... the Biden administration to make it clear that there will be consequences if South Africa works with the (Chinese Communist Party) to bully Taiwan,” including removing South Africa from a key trade program, Blackburn said.
“The United States must not provide trade benefits to countries that prioritize China’s influence over democratic partnerships,” she added.
Indian troops kill five Maoist rebels
- More than 10,000 people have died in the decades-long insurgency waged by the Naxalite movement
- The Naxalites inspired by the Chinese revolutionary leader Mao Zedong
NEW DELHI: Indian commandos shot dead five Maoist rebels in the dense jungles of central India, police said Tuesday, as security forces intensify a government bid to crush the long-running armed conflict.
More than 10,000 people have died in the decades-long insurgency waged by the Naxalite movement, who say they are fighting for the rights of marginalized indigenous people of India’s remote and resource-rich central regions.
The insurgency has drastically shrunk in recent years and a crackdown by security forces has killed nearly 200 rebels this year, according to government data.
The clash took place Monday in Maharashtra, which holds state elections next month.
“Five Naxalites were killed after they opened fire on security forces,” police superintendent Neelotpal was quoted as saying by local media.
The Times of India newspaper reported that three of those killed were women, and that a commando wounded in the firefight had to be pulled out by helicopter while under fire.
In September, Indian interior minister Amit Shah warned the Maoist rebels to surrender or face an “all-out” assault, saying the government anticipated eradicating the Naxalite movement by early 2026.
The Naxalites, named for the district where their armed campaign began in 1967, were inspired by the Chinese revolutionary leader Mao Zedong.
They demanded land, jobs and a share of the region’s immense natural resources for local residents, and made inroads in a number of remote communities across India’s east and south.
The movement gained in strength and numbers until the early 2000s when New Delhi deployed tens of thousands of security personnel against the rebels in a stretch of territory known as the “Red Corridor.”
Authorities have pumped in millions of dollars for investments in local infrastructure projects and social spending.
Ukraine drones target Russian alcohol plants, Russian officials says
- A blast shook the Biokhim biochemical plant in Russia’s Tambov region, sparking a short-lived fire
- Biokhim is one of Russia’s oldest manufacturers of ‘products of strategic importance for the state’
Ukraine overnight drone attacks caused an explosion and a fire at an ethanol manufacturing plant and damaged two other alcohol producing enterprises in Russia, Russian officials said on Tuesday.
A blast shook the Biokhim biochemical plant in Russia’s Tambov region, sparking a short-lived fire, Tambov governor Maxim Yegorov said on the Telegram messaging app.
“According to preliminary information, there are no casualties, Yegorov said.
Russia’s defense ministry said that its air defense units destroyed a total of 18 Ukrainian drones, but it did not mention Tambov in its tally.
Biokhim in the Tambov region, some 450km southeast of Moscow, is one of Russia’s oldest manufacturers of “products of strategic importance for the state,” chiefly ethanol, according to the company’s website.
The governor of the Tula region, which borders Moscow to its north, said on Tuesday that a Ukraine drone attack damaged two distilleries, in the town of Yefremov and the village of Luzhkovskyi.
There were no injuries, Tula governor Dmitry Miliayev said Telegram, adding the situation was “under control.” It was not immediately clear how big the attacks were and Miliayev did not give any further details.
Another Ukraine drone attack damaged a boiler house and a non-residential building in Russia’s western region of Bryansk, which borders Ukraine, its governor said.
There were no injuries as a result of the attack, Bryansk governor Alexander Bogomaz said Telegram.
Reuters could not independently verify the reports. There was no immediate comment from Ukraine. Kyiv has often said that its air attacks inside Russia target infrastructure key to Russia’s war efforts and are a response to Moscow’s relentless bombing of Ukrainian territory.
North Korea UN representative denies Pyongyang sent troops to Russia
UNITED NATIONS, United States: North Korea has not sent troops to Russia to help Moscow fight Ukraine, one of its United Nations representatives said Monday, dismissing Seoul’s claims as “groundless rumor.”
Seoul’s spy agency said Friday that Pyongyang sent a “large-scale” troop deployment to help its ally, claiming that 1,500 special forces were already training in Russia’s Far East and ready to head soon for the frontlines of the Ukraine war.
“As for the so-called military cooperation with Russia, my delegation does not feel any need for comment on such groundless stereotyped rumors,” a North Korean representative said at a committee meeting during the UN General Assembly.
Seoul’s claims were “aimed at smearing the image of the DPRK and undermining the legitimate, friendly and cooperative relations between two sovereign states,” the representative told the meeting, held late Monday in New York.
Pyongyang and Moscow have been allies since North Korea’s founding after World War II, and have drawn even closer since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, with Seoul and Washington long claiming that Kim Jong Un has been sending weapons for use in Ukraine.
North Korean state media have not commented on the purported troop deployment.
Russia has also not confirmed the troop deployment, but defended its military cooperation with the North.
After Seoul summoned Moscow’s ambassador in South Korea to complain, the envoy “stressed that cooperation between Russia and North Korea ... is not directed against the interests of South Korea’s security.”
Neither NATO nor the United States have confirmed the deployment, but both have cast it as a potentially dangerous escalation in the long-running Ukraine conflict.
“We have seen reports the DPRK has sent forces and is preparing to send additional soldiers to Ukraine to fight alongside Russia,” Robert Wood, US ambassador to the United Nations, told the Security Council.
“If true, this marks a dangerous and highly concerning development and an obvious deepening of the DPRK-Russia military relationship,” Wood said.
The United States and its allies have already voiced concern about North Korea providing weapons to Russia, which invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
On Tuesday, the Yonhap agency reported that the South Korean government is considering sending a team of personnel to Ukraine to monitor North Korean troops being deployed, citing a government source.
According to the source, if deployed the team will likely consist of military personnel from intelligence divisions to analyze North Korean battlefield strategies and participate in interrogating any captured prisoners of war.
Yonhap also reported that a pro-Russia Telegram account posted a photo showing the Russian and North Korean flags side by side on a Ukrainian battlefield.
