B.R.I.C.S. Discussion

Arnaud Bertrand@RnaudBertrand


Joint Statement of the BRICS Ministers of Foreign Affairs after their meeting in Russia. https://mea.gov.in/bilateral-documents.htm?dtl/37860/joint+statement+of+the+brics+ministers+of+foreign+affairsinternational+relations

4 points that stood out for me:

1) Comprehensive reform of the UN: They "support a comprehensive reform of the United Nations, including its Security Council" with a view to making it more democratic and "increase the representation of developing countries in the Council’s memberships"

2) Comprehensive reform of financial system: They "recognize the need for a comprehensive reform of the global financial architecture to enhance the voice of the developing countries and their representation in the international financial institutions." Crucially they also "underscored the importance of the enhanced use of local currencies in trade and financial transactions between the BRICS countries."

3) Calling out Israel and backing Palestinian statehood: "The Ministers expressed serious concern at Israel’s continued blatant disregard of international law, the UN Charter, UN resolutions and Court orders." They also "support Palestine’s full membership in the United Nations" as well as "the establishment of a sovereign, independent and viable State of Palestine in line with internationally recognized borders of June 1967 with East Jerusalem as its capital".

4) Condemning "unilateral coercive measures" and protectionism: They didn't name the US, but this section leaves no doubt as to who they were referring to: "[The ministers] expressed concern about the use of unilateral coercive measures, which are incompatible with the principles of the Charter of the UN and produce negative effects on economic growth, trade, energy, health and food security notably in the developing world." In the same vein they also "opposed unilateral protectionist measures, which deliberately disrupt the global supply and production chains and distort competition."

In many ways BRICS is a second and third world grouping opposed to the so called first world colonial powers and their abuses of the rest of the world... and Ironically... each other.

https://theinvestor.vn/malaysia-seeks-to-join-brics-prime-minister-d10748.html

Malaysia seeks to join BRICS: Prime Minister
By Vietnam News Agency
Tue, June 18, 2024 | 11:10 pm GMT+7

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said on Wednesday that he has expressed his country’s wish to join BRICS to President of Brazil Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

BRICS was established in 2009 as a cooperation platform for emerging economies, comprising Brazil, Russia, India and China, with South Africa joining the group in 2010.

In January 2024, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates joined the organisation as new members.

Malaysia will go through the process to enable the country to join the intergovernmental organisation, he added.

The PM told the press that Malaysia has worked closely with the Brazilian President on BRICS’s extension of members, and is waiting for response from the government of South Africa.

Thailand's Foreign Minister Maris Sanjampongsa recently handed over to his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov an official letter of intent to become a full member of BRICS.

The handover of this document was carried out after the "BRICS Dialogue with developing countries" which took place in Nizhni Novgorod, Russia on June 11. Russia assumes the rotating presidency of BRICS in 2024.

Despite the resistance of the West, it is "inevitable" that Turkey will join the BRICS, 06.19.2024.

The vice-president of the Turkish Patriotic Party foresees that the country will be able to join the organization within a while, despite the pressure of the "Atlantic forces".

Turkey's accession to the BRICS "is inevitable," but Ankara will face unprecedented pressure from the West, the deputy chairman of the Turkish Patriotic Party, Hakan Topkurulu, told Sputnik.

Earlier, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan announced the Middle Eastern country's intention to become a member of the bloc. Bidan participated in the BRICS+ meeting in Novgorod, Russia, and later said that Ankara understands the importance of the organization.

"I think Turkey should join the BRICS, which is, ultimately, an inevitable partnership for Turkey. Turkey has been a member of NATO since 1952. As a result of this association, there is a very serious group in Turkey that is linked to the West. These groups are in all political parties. They dominate the government. They influence the government. Within the ruling party, there is an ongoing struggle between Atlanticist and Eurasian forces," according to Hakan Topkurulu.

In his view, moreover, the Atlanticists are in power in Turkey today.

"However, Eurasians take advantage of the opportunity whenever they can. Personally, I don't think Turkey will be able to muster enough forces to join the BRICS, especially in this period. I also think that the United States is exerting negative pressure on Turkey's participation in the BRICS, as well as on relations with Russia," the politician considers.

"Because if Turkey joins the BRICS, that will change the balance between the West and the East in favor of the East. For that reason, Turkey's entry into the BRICS will face strong resistance from the West. However, it will not be a surprise that Turkey will make an effort to enter the BRICS in the near future, moving away from the Atlanticist powers," believes Topkurulu.

In his opinion, in addition, the United States is looking for a complete rupture in relations between Turkey and Russia, as well as between Moscow and the other countries.
"Turkey is one of those countries. Since the beginning, it has sought a policy of balance with the Atlantic in its relations with Russia. That policy is not sustainable. The United States wants Ankara to completely sever [relations with Moscow]. On the other hand, Turkey is trying to maintain relations with Russia. They are very important for Ankara, especially in the area of energy, tourism and agriculture," he concluded.

Yandex Translate from Spanish.

https://latamnews.lat/20240619/pese-a-la-resistencia-de-occidente-es-inevitable-que-turquia-se-sume-a-los-brics-1155572550.html

The mistake the US makes is that it demands exclusive relationships with countries but does not reciprocate.

When the Ukraine cut Russia off from its trade and interactions a lot of ties still remained and many of the things they cut off withered and died because they lost their market in Russia but did not get a market to replace the Russian market.

The US and EU didn't want Motor Sich and Antonov as competition for contracts within HATO... the An-70 makes the A-400M look like junk, it would have to be destroyed so eventually the once great aircraft design company might end up making parts for Boeings or AIrbus aircraft... certainly not achieving its potential.

You can't play with them any more but I don't have time to play with you.

Ironically if Ukraine had chosen to dump the west and improve relations with Russia it would be intact completely and would be making decent money, but so would the west with all their companies in Russia extracting money out of the country and stifling growth everywhere they could... keeping the Russia civilian airline industry down as much as possible...

It is ironic that US mistakes have been good for Russia... and so bad for Ukraine...

Georgia seems to be making better decisions to be honest.

The new BRICS agricultural exchange will revolutionize the global food market in the interests of Russia, by Sergey Bolotov for Rossiyskaya Gazeta. 06.30.2024.

On Monday, July 1, the Russian government and the Bank of Russia will present proposals to the president on the creation of a BRICS agricultural exchange. Russia needs a new international exchange for unimpeded trading of agricultural products without regard to Western sanctions. The other countries of the association will also find it useful for reducing costs and risks, experts say.

The Agricultural Exchange will be an important step for BRICS towards creating a cartel in the food market following the example of OPEC, which unites oil exporting countries. President of IMEMO RAS Alexander Dynkin stated this to Rossiyskaya Gazeta.

“On it, the BRICS countries will trade agricultural products. The idea of ​​such an exchange, to put it simply, is to create a cartel. In general, this will resemble OPEC, thanks to which oil prices are kept higher than they could be without coordination of the actions of exporting countries among themselves.” , says Academician Dynkin.

The same could be done with grains and other foodstuffs, as well as fertilizers, he said. The importance of these goods for the global economy is very great, emphasized Alexander Dynkin.

Control over the exchange infrastructure allows the West to make it difficult for Russia to trade food and other goods, says Yaroslav Kabakov, director of strategy at the investment company Finam.

“Many examples have already accumulated here, ranging from a ban on currencies and securities, to the London Exchange’s refusal to continue trading in Russian nickel, aluminum and copper. Russia and all other BRICS countries will be able to get rid of such risks if they create their own exchange infrastructure,” - said the financier.

People use exchanges to make deals and make mutual payments, which is exactly what the numerous anti-Russian sanctions are trying to stop, Yaroslav Kabakov added. This is especially true for trade in US dollar commodities, such as grain.

“After the launch of the agricultural exchange, the BRICS countries will be able to freely trade among themselves in their national currencies or in any other way convenient for them. That is, trade will be conducted according to their own rules, and not according to others. At the level of the general idea, this really resembles what the OPEC countries did “I think the rest of the BRICS countries will be interested in this,” he explained.

The Union of Grain Exporters asked President Vladimir Putin to create a BRICS agricultural exchange, which in itself indicates support for this initiative from domestic farmers, recalled Konstantin Lebedev, professor at the Department of International Business at the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation.

"Most stock indices are formed either in the US or in Europe. Moreover, they have the ability to regulate them not in Russia's favor. Ultimately, this affects pricing, which is reflected in consumers. Own price regulation tools within BRICS will strengthen the cohesion of the association and will allow attracting new participants," said Professor Lebedev.

Food prices are a concern for both buyers and sellers within BRICS. Russian agricultural exports amounted to $43.5 billion in 2023, and with such large volumes, even a moderate impact on prices becomes a matter of big money. With the expansion of the association due to new countries, the production of grain alone in BRICS in 2024 will reach 1.24 billion tons per year (44% of the total world production) and will almost equal consumption.

The main suppliers of food in the BRICS market are Russia and Brazil, which are ready to sell large volumes of wheat, corn and meat, and the largest importers are Egypt and China. China is also among the world's main exporters, but it also consumes a lot.

"Thanks to this, it becomes possible to create a self-sufficient system that can ensure food security for the BRICS countries. A logical solution suggests itself: its own eco-food system - its own exchange. Especially since Russia's main competitors in the agricultural market - Canada, the USA, the European Union, Australia and Argentina - are not part of BRICS, which means they will not participate in the trades," the professor emphasized.

The path to launching an agricultural exchange will not be easy, because the BRICS countries will have to conduct difficult negotiations, warns independent grain market expert Alexander Korbut.

“The difficulty is that BRICS includes both exporters and importers of food. Buying food at inflated prices is contrary to the interests of importers, but exporters will not agree to make big discounts. I think prices on the BRICS exchange will not differ much from prices on other exchanges," he predicted.

At the same time, all parties in BRICS have a common request to reduce costs in settlements, noted Alexander Korbut. "This is the task that the new exchange is capable of solving. This will be possible thanks to new digital settlement systems that are already being developed. The US will not be able to control them and dictate their terms," ​​the expert said.

As a result of the creation of the BRICS agricultural exchange, Russia’s competitiveness in the global food market will significantly increase, economist and former Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Food of the Russian Federation Leonid Kholod is convinced.

“Although formally no one has directly prohibited food trade in Russia, various obstacles are constantly being created for our exporters. This applies not only to payments, but also to logistics, and in other ways they try to complicate everything. Additional risks entail costs, they are included in the price, and in the end it becomes less attractive for the buyer. If some of these artificial obstacles are removed with the help of a friendly exchange, then Russian exports will become more competitive in the world market. That’s why Russia was the initiator, this gives us strategic advantages,” he said.

It is possible that the BRICS exchange will be open, and countries that are not full members of the association will be allowed to trade on it, Leonid Kholod noted.

"If a food exporting country for some reason reduces its supply, it immediately gives a bonus to its competitors. If the BRICS exchange is open to expansion and allows a wide range of market participants to trade with lower costs, then why shouldn't other countries join it? I think those who are not happy with the conditions on other exchanges will want to do so," the expert concluded.

https://rg.ru/2024/06/30/novaia-agrarnaia-birzha-briks-perevernet-mirovoj-rynok-edy-v-interesah-rossii.html

Here’s why India needs BRICS and Russia, by Alexey Kupriyanov, Senior Researcher, Department of International Political Problems, IMEMO, for RT.com. 06.30.2024.

The era of rigid alliances has ended, giving rise to flexible, stable and non-militarized “coalitions of the willing”.

When British economist Jim O’Neill first coined the acronym BRIC in 2001, he likely did not anticipate that this linguistic quip would evolve into one of the most promising formats in recent history.

O’Neill simply noted common characteristics among major emerging economies and, unintentionally, uttered a self-fulfilling prophecy. But his words were heard clearly – and five years later, in June 2006, the economic ministers of Brazil, Russia, India, and China, who gathered at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, brought the catchy term to life.

Thus, BRIC was born, and became BRICS after South Africa joined in 2010, before evolving into BRICS+ in 2024.

Over the years, this new format, seemingly stitched together with a loose thread, has often been predicted to fail, but it has proven unexpectedly resilient. Its success has persisted despite geopolitical disagreements between two of the founding countries – China and India – whose troops have repeatedly clashed along the border in Himalayas. BRICS has also survived financial crises and the pandemic.

What is the secret to BRICS’ resilience? Perhaps it lies in its suitability for the new realities.

The era of alliances with mandatory membership and rigid commitments is over. The current global system requires new forms, prompting the creation of networked “coalitions of the willing.” No obligations except those voluntarily assumed by each state, no restrictions on participation in other “coalitions of the willing,” no long-term demands. The fact that you support a country on one issue does not mean you will support it on another. Simple, clear, mutually beneficial interaction, and the absence of a military component – all these contribute to the stability of BRICS.

For India, BRICS+ membership is significant for several reasons.

Firstly, it provides a strong platform for increasing economic interaction with other emerging powers. The Indian leadership views economic development as a necessary foundation for claiming great power status. Currently, India is the world’s fifth-largest economy; barring serious cataclysms, in a couple of decades it will become the third largest and can aspire to a more significant role in the global governance system. To realize this dream, India needs new investment, technology, and increased export revenues, which can only be achieved through enhanced economic partnerships with other countries, including through financial and trade mechanisms within BRICS.

Secondly, it’s a matter of status. For decades, India has persistently sought a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. In the eyes of the Indian political elite, the Council addresses key global issues – and India’s absence from it is a source of bitter dissatisfaction.

Indeed, why is India inferior to the UK and France? Economically and militarily, it surpasses them. It also possesses nuclear weapons, and is one of the UN’s founding members, having been among the victors of World War II.

Or, as politicians in New Delhi ask, is it simply that the ancestors of contemporary Brits and Frenchmen once organized mass plunder, destroying several ancient civilizations and ensuring their economic growth and global hegemony with looted treasures? Where is the justice in that?

In other words, everyone seems to agree that India should be given a permanent seat on the Security Council. The problem is that when the UN was created, no one imagined that the Council would ever need to be reformed (at that time, decolonization as it later occurred seemed unlikely).

Realizing that it is unlikely to get a permanent seat on the Security Council, India decided to act differently. Given that the UN is in a perpetual crisis, New Delhi has bet on alternative formats, including BRICS. The very composition of BRICS allows it to be considered as the core of a future world architecture – if the Security Council fades away. This suits New Delhi well: in such a case, it will be part of the core governing body of the new world order from the very beginning.

Finally, China is playing an important role and is closely linked with the “status” factor. New Delhi has long accused Beijing of striving to construct a “multipolar world but with a unipolar Asia.” For India, this is unacceptable, as it claims an equal status to China in Asia and the world.

Although permanent UN Security Council membership gives China a status advantage, in BRICS, Beijing and New Delhi communicate on equal terms. Moreover, the most irritating external factors – notably Pakistan, which Delhi partly views as a Chinese client state – are absent there. This means that BRICS is quite suitable as a platform for negotiating important issues directly with China – on the understanding that if necessary, the patron will pressure the client, and force Islamabad to make concessions on matters important to New Delhi.

Thus, for India BRICS is extremely important – and for Russia, India is a crucial part of BRICS. Its importance figures on many levels – Moscow sees it as a strategic partner, as an alternative to China, and as a friend – cooperation with whom has lasted for decades and does not depend on changing geopolitical circumstances.

https://www.rt.com/india/600164-india-needs-brics-russia/

Globalization We Lost, by Igor Pereverzev, publicist, for VZGLYAD. 07.08.2024.

Globalism had not only minuses, but sometimes pluses. But the architects of globalism became more and more brazen. Their constant changing of the rules of the game could not end in anything but a rupture. There is a persistent feeling that it was Russia's departure that launched a chain reaction of self-destruction of the globalist system.

For over thirty years, we have heard mantras about being “competitive,” finding the right niche, working hard from morning till night – and then success will come. The market will put everything in its place. If you have not succeeded on a global level, it is entirely your fault. It means you were not diligent enough.

The market does influence three hairdressers near the metro, which compete with each other for clients. But on a planetary scale, everything is arranged, to put it mildly, differently. There, a command-and-control system reigns, and each region is assigned a certain role. Or rather, it reigned until recently.

The theory of comparative advantage was proposed at the beginning of the 19th century by the English political economist David Ricardo. He drew attention to the fact that due to natural reasons, it is more profitable to produce one thing in some countries, and another thing in others. Each territory has its own strengths and weaknesses. If country A spends less effort and time of workers to produce a product than country B, then it can offer a lower price for this product. Therefore, sooner or later, country B will stop producing this product. And, they say, all this perfectly optimizes global costs. Because everyone is doing their own thing, which requires fewer resources.

It was implicitly assumed that states would determine their advantages and disadvantages in the course of competitive struggle. However, the architects of globalism were not going to wait for favors from nature and distributed roles between countries based on their own ideas about who should do what. There was no demographic transition in China, millions of yesterday's peasants can be put to work at machine tools and conveyors there? Excellent! So China will be the world's factory for the final assembly of consumer goods. Does Germany have a strong engineering school? Okay, let's give them complex mechanical engineering. And so on. A kind of global state plan.

How was all this regulated in practice? If a country was included in the international trade system, then foreign investments were directed to the industries that were defined as preferable for it, either by transnational corporations or international development institutions. Let's say Kazakhstan was defined as a source of oil. Chevron immediately came to the country with its billions. Chevron is supposedly a private company. But for some reason it constantly exchanged personnel with the State Department - the American Ministry of Foreign Affairs. As soon as the extraction and transportation of Kazakh oil to the sea was established, it was immediately integrated into global supply chains. No need for any build-up, search for clients, gradual introduction to the market - nothing like that. Just an instant rocket launch. Everything is ready. That's what the state planning department decided.

But for Kazakhstan to enter world markets independently with its oil would be, to put it mildly, problematic. Firstly, no one would provide any investment or technology. Secondly, the circle of traders is narrow. And try to sell something without them. The right trader is a very necessary person. He organizes the so-called transfer pricing, when raw materials are sold to a trader at one price, and he resells them at a completely different price. This is very convenient for corrupting local elites.

As for the manufacturers of the final products, let's not be unfair - the organizers of this whole scheme were quite generous with them. The largest consumer market in the world - the American one - was opened for them for thirty years. Such a deal was always honestly fulfilled. True, one of the conditions was the placement of Pentagon military bases on their territory. The closure of the American market sometimes looked like a real drama - this is what happened to Japan in the 1990s. After the "disconnection", the Japanese switched from the production of final products to components, bet on robots, tried a lot of things. The result, as they say, is on the scoreboard.

If you tried to export something in this system that you were not supposed to sell, you encountered first of all the so-called non-tariff barriers. Your enterprise does not operate according to our regulations. Go through standardization according to our rules for a million million. Sorry, we license this activity. There are quotas for these goods - and, unfortunately, they have been exhausted. Your labeling does not correspond, and we cannot explain to you what changes to make. And so on and so forth. An unexpected supplier found himself in a real quagmire that is impossible to overcome. And no expanding sales - no development. No matter how good the product you produce, you must have a place where you can sell it in bulk. Because the more you sell, the lower your costs per unit.

Sometimes the architects of globalism directly told the authorities of a country what they could and could not do. In this sense, I highly recommend reading this article , “The Stepson of the Aviation Industry: What’s Hindering the Revival of the Tu-214?”, which tells why the director of the Kazan Aircraft Manufacturing Plant, Vitaly Kopylov, shot himself in 1994.

All this was controlled in two ways. Firstly, all trade had to be conducted exclusively by sea. Key points where land trade corridors could emerge were always kept warm. Afghanistan is a great example, through which the only natural corridor to Hindustan from the rest of the continent passes. The same goes for the Middle East. No "Silk Roads" were supposed to appear. Only through ports, only by sea. As a result, high-quality goods produced in China often ended up in Tashkent via Rotterdam, which is actually a bit strange.

At key points, ships from ten carrier strike groups and seven US fleets were always nearby. The Panama Canal, the Suez Canal, the Strait of Malacca… Such places were kept under surveillance. This phenomenon was called Global Power Projection.

The counter-cash flow went entirely through American banks. The dollar is the world's currency of trade. Everyone paid in dollars, including through a cross-rate, that is, exchanging the seller's currency for a dollar, and then the dollar for the buyer's currency. Any non-cash dollar transaction goes through a correspondent account located in one of the large American banks. That is, both the goods and the money are all under surveillance. And thanks to Hollywood, their brains are washed. At the very least, any attempt to create an enemy image out of Americans thanks to Hollywood is quite energy-consuming.

True, it would be a stretch to say that it was a system that supported American hegemony. The States themselves did not regret it either. As a result of globalization, America lost almost all of its industry. The "Rust Belt" appeared - cities in the Midwest where factories stand abandoned. The picture of decline is no better than some destroyed factories in Kyrgyzstan. Also, in the United States, technical higher education was essentially destroyed , as a result of which the entire class of American engineers and scientists today are immigrants from India, China and other so-called developing countries. And all because the United States was also assigned its role - a financial and marketing center. All the money in the world was supposed to flow here. Packaging for global sales was supposed to be made here. And it was the center of innovation. That's all. Everything else is somewhere else. The process went so far that Boeing practically forgot how to build airplanes.

Once inside such a system, it was very difficult to decide to escape from it. No one had the whole - everyone had only a part. Small countries could only relax and enjoy the iPhones that were sent to them. If some smart guy was born there, you could buy him a ticket to New York without thinking twice, where he could realize himself. There was absolutely nothing to catch on the spot.

However, not everything went according to plan for the architects. There was confusion with the largest countries. India, where one sixth of the world's population lives, generally refused to integrate into world trade. Due to various historical reasons, it has very serious barriers to entry for foreign companies. At the same time, the country has such a thing as MVP - Maximum Retail Price. This is the maximum price for which a product can be sold in a store. Such a market with a deliberately cut margin cannot be of interest to transnationals. Where India has integrated entirely is in the supply of educated people. It trains and sends millions of specialists to America, thereby pitting social pressure against itself.

The second story that is not entirely successful for the globalists is China. Firstly, they did not allow building military bases there, bypassing the usual scheme. Secondly, having collected the maximum from technological chains, the Chinese began to complete them with their own efforts. The fact that China does not intend to limit itself to the role of a factory became clear already in the mid-2000s. But the owners of the system were convinced that they would be able to nip China's ambitions in the bud. They say that the seas around are controlled. Inside there are a lot of agents of influence, whose well-being is too tied to the West. Deprivation of "markets" in Europe and the USA will bury China - this can be used to scare. And, of course, the sacred faith of Western man that the Chinese themselves are incapable of creating anything in principle, such is their nature. Greed did not allow them to withdraw all production from China in the mid-to-late 2000s and begin to strangle the country then. And then it was too late.

Today it is clear that globalism is over. The fleet is in trouble. The missile defense of ships is overloaded with drones, finished off with missiles. And in extreme cases – hypersonic weapons, which are generally impossible to intercept. The entire world surface navy, including the hegemon, especially its, is being written off. The ocean is no longer controlled. It will take at least fifteen years to invent a shield for such a sword, during which time everything will change. As for the dollar – more and more countries are brazenly trading in circumvention of it. The foundation of the system is destroyed.

After its demise, life will not be sweet at all. There are industries that work well only in a super-globalized world. For example, microelectronics. There will be no cheap smartphones or laptops without globalism. Remember what the world looked like when a VCR cost four monthly salaries. But the opportunity to build civilian aircraft ourselves, to create something, and not just supply oil, iron pellets and timber abroad, is much more expensive. This understanding did not come immediately. Russia tried for a long time and quite sincerely to fit into this scheme, and individual Russian industries really benefited from this. Yes, globalism had not only minuses, but sometimes also big pluses. But the architects of globalism became more and more brazen. Their constant changing of the rules of the game could not end in anything but a rupture. And there is a persistent feeling that it was Russia's departure that launched a chain reaction of self-destruction of the globalist system.

It would probably have lasted much longer if it had not been so two-faced. All its institutions, such as development banks, the International Monetary Fund, or the World Trade Organization, were involved in a show whose essence was to imitate the market in world trade. It is clear why this happened. Initially, the system appeared as an antagonist to the USSR with its own state planning. They could not publicly admit that they were largely repeating the same model with all sorts of regional inter-industry balances. Lies were their undoing. Lies and injustice in the distribution of goods.

https://vz.ru/opinions/2024/7/8/1275192.html

This is a highly recommended explanation of what will be, probably in October, the new BRICS unit of settlement, called the Unit. Which is designed to take over from the US$ originally over several years, maybe 10+ but now no doubt ASAP.

US Congress Sees No Threat in Mexico Joining BRICS, 07.30.2024.

US believes that Mexico's possible accession to BRICS does not pose a military threat.

WASHINGTON, July 30 - RIA Novosti. Mexico's possible accession to BRICS does not pose a military threat to the United States, says Eric Edelman, deputy head of the congressionally approved National Defence Strategy Commission.

"This (BRICS - ed.) is not a serious military organization," he said at a hearing in the US Senate, commenting on the risks of Mexico joining BRICS against the backdrop of Washington's desire to include Ukraine in NATO.

Edelman added that he does not see any opportunity for the United States to influence Mexico's possible entry into the group, since the United States is not a member of BRICS.

Russia became the BRICS chair for the coming year on January 1. It began with the accession of new members to the organization - in addition to Russia, Brazil , India , China and South Africa , it now includes Egypt , Ethiopia , Iran , the UAE and Saudi Arabia .

Representatives of Mexico are already participating in some BRICS-related initiatives. For example, in June, Kazan Mayor Ilsur Metshin , who initiated the holding of the international BRICS+ Cities Forum in the city and the creation of the BRICS+ Association of Cities and Municipalities, noted that representatives of the BRICS countries, as well as other countries, including Mexico, came to the forum.

https://ria.ru/20240730/meksika-1963023197.html

The secret to the success of BRICS is not what it is, but what it’s not, by Henry Johnston, a Moscow-based RT editor who worked in finance for over a decade, for RT. 07.30.2024.

The group is the antidote to a declining hegemon pursuing its own interests without regard for problems that require system-level solutions.

BRICS is on the move. It already expanded at the beginning of this year, while no fewer than 40 countries have expressed interest in joining. Russian Federation Council Chairwoman Valentina Matvienko recently claimed that 24 countries are in line to actually become members.

But successful blocs comprising such a diverse assortment of nations are exceedingly rare. What could possibly compel countries so culturally, geographically, and politically disparate to band together?

Here we can offer the standard line about how BRICS does not seek to corral members into line around a narrow set of interests. Nor does it impose ideological purity tests, or insist upon a certain political makeup. It respects sovereignty. It offers a vehicle for nations left on the margins of Western-controlled institutions to have a stronger voice. This is all true but it has been said many times.

Let’s instead go for a more provocative question: what is so attractive about a group that has very few actual accomplishments to its name? It is in fact this relative lack of achievement that many naysayers have latched on to in dismissing the whole enterprise.

To find a good example of this point of view, look no further than the man who coined the acronym in the first place, former Goldman Sachs analyst Jim O’Neill. Ahead of the group’s summit in South Africa last year, O’Neill told the Financial Times that BRICS had “never achieved anything since they first started meeting” and that beyond “powerful symbolism” he wasn’t sure what its members were even hoping to achieve.

And indeed, one will notice that the group’s muscle is often expressed merely in the raw economic or human potential of its members – such-and-such a percentage of global GDP, or population, or oil production, or the number of members (current members are Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Iran, and Ethiopia). More seldom heard is what the group has actually done.

Of the concrete achievements of the bloc, perhaps the most notable is the founding of a development bank that aims to rival the World Bank. The New Development Bank (NDB) was begun in 2015 with its headquarters in Shanghai, and was seeded with $50 billion to fund infrastructure and sustainability projects. Around the same time, a BRICS monetary fund called the Contingent Reserve Arrangement (CRA) – an alternative to the IMF – was created. These are institutions born out of years of frustration at the failure to reform their US-dominated counterparts.

However, they have not entirely lived up to their hype. Brazilian economist Paulo Nogueira Batista, who represented his country at the IMF from 2007 to 2015 and then was vice-president of the NDB from 2015 to 2017, prepared a paper for the Valdai Club meeting in Sochi, Russia in 2023 in which he painted a sober picture of the impact these institutions have had.

“When we started out with the CRA and the NDB, there was considerable concern with what the BRICS were doing in this area in Washington, DC., in the IMF and World Bank. I can testify to that because I lived there at the time, as executive director for Brazil and other countries in the board of the IMF. As time went by, however, people in Washington relaxed, sensing perhaps that we were going nowhere with the CRA and the NDB.”

The NDB has approved only $33 billion worth of projects in its entire history; the World Bank committed $128 billion in 2023 alone. Of the projects approved by the BRICS lender, roughly two-thirds have been in dollars, according to an investor presentation cited by Reuters. Perhaps surprisingly to some who expect BRICS to offer an immediate and brazen challenge to the West, the NDB has even respected Western sanctions on Russia, putting new transactions with Moscow on hold. It is no wonder that in the halls of US-led institutions concern about this upstart rival has subsided.

The other realm in which BRICS has been expected to deliver something tangible is in launching its own currency. But here, unfortunately, a lot of loose talk has set up the group for disappointment. A wave of hype early last year, even in Western establishment outlets, touting a soon-to-be-created BRICS currency as having the potential to “shake the dollar’s dominance,” has given way to skepticism.

It is loose talk because a currency per se is not what is on the agenda. The BRICS nations have no intention of surrendering their national currencies – and therefore much of their sovereignty – in a Eurozone-like experiment. Consumers won’t be taking a wad of brics to the grocery store.

And it is not entirely clear how such an arrangement would even work, particularly given that nearly all BRICS countries run current account surpluses. This is a complicated topic best left for another day, but suffice it to say that a certain amount of restructuring of the BRICS economies would be needed for such a plan to be viable. In any case, India has flat-out rejected the idea of a BRICS currency.

What is much more likely to happen is a means of settlement will be developed among central banks for imbalances between surplus and deficit countries. It will be something of a neutral reserve asset, perhaps akin to the bancor system proposed by John Maynard Keynes at Bretton Woods but dismissed by the Americans. Meanwhile, it certainly bears mentioning that a BRICS alternative to the Western SWIFT financial messaging system seems imminent.

Such developments would, of course, be hugely significant, and would count as a genuine achievement, but this will not happen overnight. At least insofar as a new currency is concerned, this is certainly an area where excessive hype and dramatic proclamations have obscured what is a nuanced and highly technical matter.

Finally, although a handful of BRICS countries have free-trade agreements with each other, there is currently no such agreement covering the entire nine-nation group. Although intra-group trade has been growing at a brisk pace – and more and more of this is settled in local currencies – an initiative floated by China to reach a free-trade deal within the bloc was not supported by the other members. The brief history of BRICS has shown without a doubt that the differences among members are real. Their interests do not always align.

So what we have summarized is a certain gap between what is being trumpeted in some quarters and what has transpired. The purpose of pointing this out is not to denigrate the BRICS project or to side with the naysayers. The aim, rather, is to show that that the exuberant interest in BRICS cannot be attributed to its merits alone.

It is said that animals can sense a tsunami coming and sometimes flee for higher ground. Upon seeing all manner of mammals, reptiles, birds, and insects moving in the same direction, it is of far greater interest to ascertain what is driving them en masse than to fixate on the makeup of the scurrying pack. In the case of BRICS, the analogy holds: it’s more a matter of what they are running ‘from’ than running ‘to’.

What has triggered this flight to safer ground is the unseemly and prying arm of an ever more belligerent Washington. The US has weaponized the financial system it presides over, ever more frequently resorted to unilateral sanctions, expanded the scope for secondary sanctions, and also employs economic blockades, and various forms of coercion – up to and including the sabotage of major energy infrastructure – in order to keep as much of the globe as possible under its thumb.

A US Treasury Department report found a 933% increase in the use of sanctions in the decades since the September 11 attacks – and those figures are through 2021, meaning that the avalanche of restrictions unleashed in the last two years aren’t even captured in the data. In 2023 alone, the US added 2,500 persons, comprising 1,621 entities and 879 individuals, to its Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons (SDN) list. The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control’s list of individuals and entities under sanctions reportedly runs to over 2,000 pages featuring some 12,000 names.

In recent years, America’s global policing has plunged its tentacles into hitherto unthinkable realms. There was a time when sanctions were reserved for countries whose transgressions against the ‘rules-based order’ were of a certain magnitude. This does not justify their use, but most players at least knew where they stood. If before the US responded to real or perceived threats by using what historian Immanuel Wallerstein called a “velvet glove concealing a mailed fist,” the velvet glove has now been cast aside and the mailed fist is roaming the world in paroxysms of anxious rage. Examples are many.

In its desperate effort to suffocate Russia’s defence industry, late last year the Treasury was authorized to sanction any financial institution seen as helping Moscow’s military industrial base. NATO ally Türkiye has been warned that its banks could be targeted for facilitating trade in dual-use goods with Russia. The UAE got a similar lecture. China is, of course, in the crosshairs. Prior to taking matters into its own hands, the US slapped sanctions on the undesirable Nord Stream pipeline, over the feeble objections of staunch ally Germany.

Some of the recent measures can be seen as nothing less than outrageous meddling in the affairs of others. Uganda’s ‘sodomy law’ passed last year compelled the US to reevaluate “all aspects” of its engagement with the country. Officials have indicated that they will even review Uganda’s eligibility for duty-free access to the US for hundreds of goods, a move that would further impair the African country’s already fledgling economy.

Georgia’s law mandating that NGOs funded from abroad register as such and submit to tighter regulations was passed by a legitimate legislature in accordance with democratic procedure. Yet it elicited a virulent reaction from the US and its subservient European allies (and, yes, sanctions are in the works). The EU has even gone so far as to suspend Georgia’s accession process – a position that the US clearly endorses.

Such is life under the frenzied tyranny of the Office of Foreign Assets Control, a once-obscure Treasury department that now bestrides the globe like a colossus. South China Morning Post columnist Alex Lo remarked that the weaponized dollar hangs over many developing countries “like the sword of Damocles” and that BRICS offers an “escape route.” Lo sees this as the main attraction of the group.

Indeed this is the case, but what is transpiring should be seen in a far greater context than just a weaponized currency. Italian economist and historian Giovanni Arrighi, whose work I discussed at length in a previous article, wrote that “declining hegemonic states are faced with the Sisyphean task of containing forces that keep rolling forth with ever renewed strength. Sooner or later, even a small disturbance can tilt the balance in favor of the forces that wittingly or unwittingly are undermining the already precarious stability of existing structures.”

It was inevitable that the shift in economic power away from the West and toward the rising powers of the Global South would lead to those countries having greater influence in global affairs. And perhaps it was inevitable that the US would embark on the Sisyphean task of containing their rise.

The fear of even a small disturbance goes some way toward explaining what appears as a brittleness and intransigence at the heart of the US’ posture toward the world. The line must be held everywhere, all at once. Underlying this stance is a deep anxiety, a foreboding that if one brick (BRIC?) is out of place, the whole edifice could come crashing down. This, Arrighi tells us, is a typical symptom of the twilight of hegemony.

BRICS thus represents the rest of the world’s response to what Arrighi calls the “final boom” during which a declining power pursues its national interest without regard for the problems that require system-level solutions. It is a state of affairs whereby the US, paradoxically, seeks dominion over the world while making no effort to exercise the type of stewardship of the system that its position would imply. Proper stewardship would entail seeking ways to accommodate as smoothly as possible the changes that are happening anyway. It cannot be the 1950s or even the 1990s forever.

And yet the US exerts an influence both oppressive and absent. It is touchy on all matters related to its hegemony but entirely unresponsive to the actual important issues of the day. This is the under-the-surface magnet pushing disparate nations together under the BRICS banner. It is, as Lo says, “an escape route.” The group represents a new, if still relatively unproven, platform for seeking the exact type of system-level solutions to system-level problems that are not being sought elsewhere. This is a powerful driving force.

It should also be mentioned that the fragmented world that is dawning does not lend itself to the type of rigid and formal institution that thrived in the postwar years. That era has passed. BRICS has wisely refrained from institutionalizing ties through an inflexible policy agenda and a permanent bureaucracy. It seems comfortable with its heterogeneity and loose affiliations.

And this leads to a final thought that is entirely subjective: whatever its limitations and however few its achievements so far, one senses in the rise of BRICS the contours of a great and sweeping change. It is an endeavor with a momentum of its own whose significance will not be measured by tallies on a spreadsheet.

https://www.rt.com/business/601140-brics-accomplishments-countries-join/

Venezuela warns US of BRICS energy move, 08.03.2024.

The energy-rich nation has threatened to transfer the development rights to its oil and gas fields to allies.

Venezuela could transfer the development rights to its vast oil and gas fields that are currently operated by American energy companies to entities from BRICS nations, President Nicolas Maduro warned on Friday during a press conference in Caracas.

BRICS originally comprised Brazil, Russia, India, and China before subsequently adding South Africa and, at the beginning of this year, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates. Numerous other countries, including Venezuela, have expressed interest in joining the group.

“If these people up north and their partners in the world make the mistake of their lives, then those oil blocks and those gas blocks that were already signed up [for US companies] will go to our BRICS allies,” Maduro said, adding that Washington was at the forefront of plans to destabilize his country.

With an estimated 303 billion barrels, Venezuela accounts for approximately 17% of global reserves of crude oil, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), which lists the Bolivarian republic as having the world’s largest proven oil reserves.

Chevron, the only American energy major still operating in Venezuela, scored a license to pump oil in the country in November 2022, a month after a sanctions waiver was implemented. This came in exchange for the unblocking of some of Caracas’ oil proceeds that had been frozen by US sanctions.

Chevron is currently involved in four onshore and offshore projects in Venezuela through a partnership with state-controlled oil giant Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA). Earlier this year, the US company announced the goal of increasing output by 35% year-on-year by bringing new wells online.

Earlier this week, the White House recognized Western-backed opposition figure Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia as the winner of Venezuela’s presidential election on Sunday, despite the official results showing incumbent Maduro having won. The Venezuelan leader has urged Washington to “keep its nose out of Venezuela,” saying that the protests that erupted in the country after the results were announced were an attempted “coup.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin congratulated Maduro earlier this week on being reelected. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday that Venezuela’s opposition should admit defeat and congratulate the winner. He added that it is important for Venezuela to avoid attempts at destabilization orchestrated by third countries, and to remain free of outside meddling.

Earlier this week, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil Pinto confirmed that Maduro had received an invitation to take part in the BRICS summit scheduled for October in the Russian city of Kazan.

https://www.rt.com/news/602084-venezuela-oil-gas-maduro-brics/

Which Western Energy Firms Profit From Venezuela's Oil Riches as Maduro Mulls Expanding BRICS Share?, by Ilya Tsukanov for Sputnikglobe.com. 08.05.2024.

Caracas has warned that it may strip Western energy companies of highly lucrative extraction contracts and replace them with oil and gas majors from the BRICS bloc. Which American and European firms currently have a major stake in Venezuela's oil sector, and who may be in line to replace them? Sputnik explores.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro told reporters on Friday that the country’s biggest energy investments are coming from BRICS members, and warned that if the US and its allies “make the mistake of their lives” by continuing their attempts to destabilize Venezuela, their oil and gas contracts could go to Venezuela’s BRICS allies.

Possessing an estimated 300 billion barrels of oil and 195 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, Venezuela accounts for a whopping 17% of global reserves of crude oil, and about 3% of known gas reserves. BRICS+ collectively accounts for some 43% of global oil reserves, and has about 50% of the world’s gas reserves, meaning if Venezuela were to ramp up cooperation with and ultimately join the bloc (as Caracas has expressed interest in doing), these indicators could jump to 60% and 53%, respectively.

State-owned oil giant Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) is Venezuela’s largest energy producer, with total national output by PDVSA and foreign partners reaching 993,000 barrels per day (bpd) in July, and shipped to Asia, the US, Europe and Cuba.

What Сontracts Сould West Stand to Lose?

US and European energy giants were largely frozen out of operations in Venezuela in 2019 by US sanctions threats. A 2022 deal enabled their return in an oil-for-debt arrangement designed to minimize cash flowing into PDVSA’s coffers. US oil giant Chevron now pumps up to 200,000 bpd of Venezuelan crude from four joint venture sites, and plans to increase output by another 65,000 bpd by year’s end.

Spanish oil major Repsol extracts some 20,000 bpd of oil and 40 million cubic feet of gas daily, and is looking to expand its stake in undeveloped oil fields with a production potential of over 300,000 bpd. Repsol’s output is concentrated at four main sites, including the offshore Perla Field off Venezuela’s northwest coast.

Italian energy company Eni has also been authorized to resume pumping oil in Venezuela, with a joint venture with PDVSA in the Petrosucre field producing about 2,200 bpd (but able to produce 24,000 bpd or more historically). Eni is also in talks with PDVSA about unfreezing the shallow-water Corocoro crude project, and joining the Perla gas project.

Who Could Replace Western Energy Companies?

Historically, Venezuela has proved capable of producing upwards of 3.5 million bpd of oil. When production dipped to just 393,000 bpd in mid-2020 thanks to crippling US sanctions, Caracas turned to its partners, including Iran and Russia, to ride out the crisis. Iran sent a series of humanitarian flotillas packed with spare parts for refineries and emergency gasoline supplies. Russia, for its part, stepped in to assist in the export of Venezuelan oil supplies abroad while avoiding US sanctions. Russian operations in Venezuela have been managed by Roszarubezhneft since 2020, when oil giant Rosneft quit the Venezuelan market due to US sanctions threats. Five Roszarubezhneft-PDVSA joint ventures currently produce up to 125,000 bpd.

Global uncertainty, the crisis in the Middle East, the West’s politicized block on Russian oil purchases and heightened tensions in East Asia mean global demand for energy will continue to remain strong for the foreseeable future.

If Western countries proceed with the US-led effort to try to undermine Venezuela and plot coups to replace Maduro, Caracas has plenty of foreign friends with ample experience operating in the Latin American country, from Russia’s Roszarubezhneft to the China National Petroleum Corporation and Sinopec, Belorusneft AZS, and Indian National Oil Company subsidiary ONGC Videsh Limited.

https://sputnikglobe.com/20240805/which-western-energy-firms-profit-from-venezuelas-oil-riches-as-maduro-mulls-expanding-brics-share-1119649165.html

Representative to the UN: Venezuela will contribute its oil reserves to the BRICS group, 08.10.2024.

Venezuela will be a great addition to the BRICS group (founded by Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) because it has the largest oil reserves in the world, Joaquín Pérez Ayestarán, deputy ambassador of Caracas to the United Nations (UN), told Sputnik.

"We have the largest certified oil reserves in the world that will also add to the basket of products that the BRICS as a whole can offer," Pérez Ayestarán said in an interview.

On the other hand, Pérez Ayestarán said that the Latin American country hopes that the decision to join the BRICS group will be announced at the summit of the bloc that will be hosted next October in the Russian city of Kazan.

"It will be a very welcome development in Venezuela. But if not, we are still there with our offer and our commitment to be an active actor in this new world," Pérez Ayestarán said.

The President of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, received an invitation to attend the BRICS summit in the Russian city of Kazan, scheduled for October 23 and 24.

On January 1, Russia assumed the rotating presidency of the BRICS group for 2024, a year that began with the admission of new members.

The Russian chairmanship of the group is based on the theme of strengthening multilateralism for the sake of fair and secure global development.

Yandex Translate from Spanish.

https://noticiaslatam.lat/20240810/venezuela-aportara-sus-reservas-petroleras-al-grupo-brics-afirma-representante-ante-la-onu-1156752967.html

The fact of the matter is that while the oil reserves Venezuela is believed to have will benefit BRICS, the honest truth is that any country joining BRICS is about growth and development of both parties so even if they don't bring enormous oil reserves the extra market and the extra resources will be valuable and as they grow and develop with free trade and without pressure to be or do this or that there might be 1,000 things they can bring to BRICS to make it better.

I mentioned above this:

The US and EU didn't want Motor Sich and Antonov as competition for contracts within HATO... the An-70 makes the A-400M look like junk, it would have to be destroyed so eventually the once great aircraft design company might end up making parts for Boeings or AIrbus aircraft... certainly not achieving its potential.

I am sure Kiev thought that Motor Sich and Antonov and other companies and resources made them attractive to the west as a new ally, but the west is destructive and they don't want Motor Sich and Antonov... they already have engine and aircraft companies that don't want competition from Ukraine, so those companies were always going to be destroyed because they had to cut themselves from their main market customer... Russia... to join the western block... and the new partners are not interested in their products... especially the ones that are superior to what the west makes... the west is not trying to get better, it is trying to damage Russia and moving into the Ukraine gets them closer than ever before.

They are the opposite of the Borg really... they have crappy transports and would make Kiev buy A-400M transport planes eventually, instead of realising the An-70 was superior and should replace the European A-400M immediately.... but the west is not interested in getting better.

They have the same problem with computer chips, a European country owns the technology to make high end chips and Americas brilliant idea was to force them to not sell to China or Russia and as a result China and Russia are working on their own alternative solutions to the problem... and with new technology their solutions might actually be better than what the European country has to sell and they are afraid.

What if China or Russia or both of them come up with new technology that is cheaper and faster and they put it into mass production... all of a sudden the west no longer controls the technology and cannot make a good living renting it to other countries who need high performance chips.

It is the same with the US dollar, when you use it as a weapon you break it... it was only ever made of glass, but it was earning you a good living, and now that income is going to stop.

More than that... when everyone is trading in US dollars you get a good idea of who is spending what and where, but when they trade in their own currencies you have no idea.

Same with shipping oil... before with European Ships and London Insurance they didn't just make money distributing Russian oil around the world, they could also keep tabs on how much they were selling and who to... and taking a cut of the profits for their services.

Now they don't earn and they don't know what is being shipped where for certainty.

Like I keep saying, the west is destroying itself... Russia wanted to be partners and were rejected... the longer the conflict in the Ukraine continues the more damage the west is taking and the more Russia sees it future getting brighter.

Losing 30 million lives in WWII was a terrible price to pay for the entire Soviet Union, but the alternative would probably be worse in the long term.

Either way Russia is not getting better choices, so stick to it.

BRICS Blockchain Payment System 'Game-Changer' Amid Unstoppable Dedollarization - Expert, by Svetlana Ekimenko for Sputnikglobe.com. 09.04.2024.

The global trend to abandon the increasingly weaponized US dollar has been gaining steam. A new currency transaction platform being developed by BRICS is set to further advance the digitalization trend and transition to other currencies in mutual settlements, the financial expert noted.

Moscow’s decision to create a new BRICS blockchain-based payment system is a "game-changing" development for a multipolar world, Christopher Douglas Emms, head of the Brokerage Division, LM Investments, told Sputnik on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok.

"I think it's a huge and significant development, because […] blockchain is an immutable payment. And what that means is it can't be messed with. It also removes any element, really, of corruption, because when you make that payment, it's totally transparent. And once it's made, no one can ever delete it. It has an online digital footprint that anyone can look up, which is totally transparent and also secure and fast," the expert noted.

An immutable transaction refers to a transaction that, once recorded, cannot be altered or deleted. This characteristic is primarily associated with blockchain technology.

As part of BRICS’ efforts to ditch the weaponized US dollar in settlements, Emms weighed in on the increased talk of a new BRICS currency emerging, adding that there was no clarity yet as to "what form that will take."

As all economies are different, the expert added he is no fan of a "one-currency-fits-all" approach. He recalled the "disaster that the euro has been."

"I think we may see a currency that is backed on a basket of different BRICS nation currencies, be that the Russian ruble, the Chinese renminbi, the Indian rupee, the South African rand, these kind of large economies coming together and forming something that will essentially allow everyone to clear payments between each other in a lot better way," the financial analyst said.

The BRICS payment system would be the final nail in the coffin of the "unstoppable" dedollarization trend, the expert explained, adding that the US greenback "has nothing that backs it," and "there's no commodity that underlies it." Furthermore, Washington's greenback printing spree is one of the factors driving the trend.

“The US dollar has nothing that backs it. There's no commodity that underlies it, which then allows the Federal Reserve to print as much as possible. That, coupled with the large amount of debt per capita that the US is experiencing […] in the past 20 or so years, are making it really, in my view, unsustainable,” the pundit said.

He likened the dollar to a house of cards that will inevitably collapse once people stop using it.

Independent sovereign nations should not have other countries such as the US “telling them what to do or actually seeing what business they do with each other,” he added.

As for the manner in which the Telegram-linked TON cryptocurrency collapsed recently in the wake of Pavel Durov’s arrest, the pundit pointed to how it was already bouncing back. He suggested that it just shows the robustness of Telegram as a company, which has become “an institution.”

TON’s price slumped by as much as 25% to reach $5.24 on August 25, a day after the news of Durov’s detention broke. It then completely collapsed a week after the arrest, falling by 93% in a matter of minutes, only to rebound back to $4.61, as of September 4.

“Everyone around the world uses Telegram because it has now overtaken WhatsApp and all these other brands that have basically, we've found out, been giving all of our data and all our messages away to the American authorities.”

Telegram is a "transparent and secure system," and "people aren't spying on it," with its co-founder and CEO "willing to go to prison for that fact," Emms noted. He voiced the opinion that Telegram’s cryptocurrency wallet function will expand, and that "the sky's the limit" for TON.

https://sputnikglobe.com/20240904/brics-blockchain-payment-system-game-changer-amid-unstoppable-dedollarization---expert-1120012890.html

I think the idea of a BRICS currency is flawed if they mean a currency for BRICS countries to use... like EU member countries use the Euro.

It would be much better for BRICS countries to continue to use their own currencies, but have their own special BRICS currency for international trade between BRICS countries.

If all BRICS country banks accepted local currencies and this BRICS currency it means it does not matter if this country or that country does not want to make its currency convertable to another currency as long as all currencies are convertable to the BRICS currency and from the BRICS currency can be converted back to any BRICS country currency in that country.

Right now India pays in Rupees but Rupees are not readily convertable into Rubles or other currencies so the unbalanced trade deficit between Russia and India means Russian companies are accumulating lots of Rupees.

With a BRICS trade currency the Russian companies can buy BRICS dollars with the Rupees and then transfer those BRICS dollars to any BRICS country they want to do trade with and then convert from the BRICS currency to the local currency and buy what they need.

There might be other BRICS countries that have a trade imbalance with India and need Rupees so Russia could move their rupees to this country and get local products or BRICS currency in return.

Each country having reserves of currency from the countries they trade with would be useful and make trade easier, but excess or unwanted currencies could be converted to BRICS dollars to be spent anywhere in BRICS.

As BRICS expands and with countries that don't want to join but might like to trade then they can buy BRICS dollars too... BRICS dollars might become the currency of international trade between BRICS and BRICS friendly countries.

The point is that women should be getting jobs because they are the best candidate for the job... not because they happen to be a woman and we don't have enough women working for us so we are going to hire her even if she can't do the job well.

It is perfectly normal for a woman in the Soviet Union to be a doctor. Women doctors in the west tend to be common in some areas, but women are still a minority.

Yet in roles like Nurses they tend to dominate...

That is western cultural thing, the role of the mother and wife is not really respected enough for someone to say that is what they do. To feel equal western women want to work full time and be mother.

Part of BRICS is about not telling members what they can or can't do... no pushing feminism, no pushing this language or religion or system of government... everyone is an independent country and BRICS is cooperation and trade, but not telling others what to do.

Will a BRICS Bretton Woods Take Place in Kazan?, by Pepe Escobar for Sputnikglobe.com. 09.23.2024.

With less than a month before the crucial BRICS annual summit in Kazan under the Russian presidency, serious informed discussions are raging in Moscow and other Eurasian capitals on what should be at the table in the de-dollarization and alternative payment system front.

Earlier this month Andrey Mikhailishin, head of the task force on financial services of the BRICS Business Council, detailed the list of top projects under consideration. They include:

• A common unit of account - as in The Unit, whose contours were first revealed exclusively by Sputnik.

• A platform for multilateral settlements and payments in BRICS digital currencies, connecting the financial markets of BRICS members: that’s BRICS Bridge, which bears similarities with the Bank of International Settlements-linked MBridge,  already in effect. That will complement intrabank systems already in action, as in Russia’s SPFS and Iran’s CPAM settling financial transactions – and 60% of their trade - in their own currencies.

• A blockchain-based payment system that entirely bypasses the US dollar: BRICS Pay. Arguably 159 participants may be ready to adopt this sanction-evading, similar-to-SWIFT mechanism right away.

• A settlement depository (Clear).

• An insurance system.

• And crucially a BRICS rating agency, independent from the Western giants.

What’s at stake is the extremely complex design of a brand-new financial system – decentralized and using digital technology. BRICS Clear, for instance, will be using blockchain to record securities and exchange them.

As for The Unit, the value of the common unit of account is pegged by 40% to gold and by 60% to a basket of BRICS member’s national currencies. The BRICS Business Council considers The Unit a “convenient and universal” instrument, since a unit can be converted into any national currency.

That would definitely solve the nagging problem of exchange rate volatility when cash balances accumulate from settlements in national currencies; for example, a mountain of Indian rupees used to pay for Russian energy.

Who Do I Call to Talk to BRICS?

I asked a very direct question to two Russian analysts, one of them a finance tech executive with vast experience across Europe, and the other the head of an investment fund with global reach. Considering the sensitivity of their posts, they prefer to remain anonymous.

The question: Is BRICS ready to become an actor in Kazan next month, and what should be on the table in terms of the strategy to establish an alternative payment system?

The Answers. Analyst 1:

“Time has come for BRICS to become a real actor. The world demands it. The leaders of BRICS countries clearly understand it. They have the moral power and the political will to set up an organization to provide a number for BRICS to be called in – that’s the best question for the upcoming summit.”
The analyst is referring to what could be dubbed “the Kissinger moment”, when Dr. K famously quipped, in the Cold War era, “when I want to talk to Europe, who do I call?”

Now to Analyst 2:

“For a BRICS agreement amongst countries to mean something, countries need to agree on a framework of action and that means accepting some responsibilities in exchange for certain rights. And it sounds there’s no better way to achieve that than to arrive at mutually agreed obligations on settlement of financial transactions.”

One of the analysts added a very important, specific point: “By now the situation is pretty clear, to properly address the issue of cross-border payments. The best mechanism should be based on the New Development Bank (NDB), given that Russia has a mandate to propose the new president of that organization. Whoever the candidate will be, cross-border payments should be at the top of his agenda.”

The NDB is the BRICS bank, based in Shanghai. The analyst hopes this decision on the future of the NDB will be made before the BRICS summit: "Given the diplomatic and political considerations, the candidate should be made known, formally or informally to the member countries.”

As it stands, the talk of the town in Moscow informed circles is that Alexey Mohzin, the IMF’s executive director for Russia, has a 60% chance to be appointed to the NDB. In parallel, Ksenia Yudaeva, a former G20 sherpa and former deputy of Russia Central Bank’s Elvira Nabiullina, may become the new representative with the IMF.

So what may be in the cards is a NDB/IMF reshuffle on the Russian front. The focus should be on the potential for future productive change – rather than missed opportunities; the NDB’s policies so far have not been exactly revolutionary - considering that the bank’s statutes are linked to the US dollar.
The new deal could place the NDB as leverage for a reform of the IMF, rather than an alternative to it.

The “Kissinger moment” does play a key role in this equation. It will highlight that until the moment turns into reality, the NDB should be the sole actor for effective changes in crucial matters like the stability of the financial infrastructure.

And from that perspective, as one of the analysts note, “The UNIT and all other similar projects may be presented as complementary risk management tools hedging against reckless monetary policies and Global Financial Crisis-2 risks.”

Time though is running out – fast. President Putin recently met with the Russian Union of Industrialists. They have sent a letter to the administration and the Russian Central Bank outlining what they consider the most promising ideas.

The Unit is one of them. Prime Minister Mishustin’s government is now on the final stages of deciding which projects to support: for the BRICS summit in Kazan, and one week before, for the annual summit of the BRICS Business Council in Moscow.

A BRICS Bretton Woods?

I posed the same BRICS question to the Russian analysts also to indispensable Prof. Michael Hudson – who actually provided a concise in-depth critique of what may be on the table, while offering a different solution.

For Prof. Hudson, “a new institution has to be created - a Central Bank empowered to issue credit to finance the trade and payments deficits of some countries, with an artificial bancor-type SDR [Special Drawing Rights].”

Prof. Hudson argues “this would be different (his italics) from a clearing house system for existing banks. It would be a BRICS' IMF. Its bancors credit or balance sheet would only be for settlements among governments, not a generally traded currency. Indeed, making the bancor widely traded as a speculative vehicle (such as the UNIT is) would introduce major instability and have nothing to do with the needed bank transfer balance sheet.”

A reformed NDB, possibly next year under a new Russian presidency, should have all it takes to become a “BRICS’ IMF.”
Prof. Hudson adds that “to succeed, the Kazan conference should be a full-fledged BRICS Bretton Woods. Maybe it is too soon to actually introduce a fait accompli. Perhaps it would be a venue to throw open a set of alternatives -- including what would happen by ‘doing nothing’ and going with the current IMF system. The fact that the IMF just cancelled its trip to analyze the Russian economy may be a catalyst.”

Prof. Hudson in fact refers directly to Executive Director for Russia, Alexey Mohzin, who confirmed that the IMF should have come to Russia for consultations, part of their annual review of the Russian economy, but cancelled it because of “technical unpreparedness”.

All that brings us once again to the “Kissinger moment”; it’s unclear whether Kazan will come up with a “BRICS number” anyone could call.

Prof. Hudson makes an essential last point on the Global South’s dollar debt: he stresses “how to handle BRICS members existing overhang of dollar debts” is a major problem.

What is clear is that “the BRICS bank [the NDB] should not finance deficits by member countries for such payments. In practice, there would have to be a moratorium on such payments - in view of the present weaponization of Western finance.”

Prof. Hudson recalls the chapter in his book Super Imperialism “on how the US moved against Britain in 1944 to get an agreement that it then presented as a pro-US fait accompli to Europe.” The book “reviews all the arguments that took place there.”

Prof. Hudson wishes he would be part of the new, ongoing process. Imagine if BRICS+ manages to pull it off: getting a Global Majority-approved agreement on a new, equitable, fair financial system then presented to the $35 trillion-indebted superpower as a fait accompli.

https://sputnikglobe.com/20240923/pepe-escobar-will-a-brics-bretton-woods-take-place-in-kazan-1120257701.html

Ditching the Dollar: Putin Announces Work on Independent BRICS Payment System for Global Trade, 09.26.2024.

Russia, together with BRICS countries, is working on creating its own payment system for the independent handling of all foreign trade, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced.
"In cooperation with BRICS countries, we are working on creating our own payment and settlement system, which will create conditions for the effective and independent servicing of all foreign trade," Putin said during the plenary session of the Russian Energy Week International Forum.

BRICS is an interstate organization established in 2006. As of January 1, 2024, Russia assumed the chairmanship of BRICS. This year, new members have joined the group - alongside Russia, Brazil, India, China, and South Africa, it now includes Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia.

Putin further elaborated that BRICS sees its mission in combining economic potential and creating a space for mutually beneficial cooperation between countries.

"BRICS, with Russia chairing the organization this year, sees its mission in combining economic potential and creating opportunities for all those interested in harmonious, mutually beneficial cooperation," he said.

The president emphasized that this is about mutually beneficial cooperation. "In other words, it's in the common interests of our countries and peoples," Putin clarified.

Some people think that they can use illegal sanctions against Russia to their advantage in the energy sector, Putin said.
The president called modern energy one of the key industries, a real foundation for global development, adding that that its calm operation according to transparent and understandable rules, as well as the development of deposits, processing of resources, and uninterrupted supplies to the market create a solid foundation for economic growth, the social sphere, and improving the well-being of citizens.

"Unfortunately, this truism is being taken less and less into account by those who have adopted the mechanisms of illegal sanctions and believe that they can use them to their advantage in the energy sector," he noted.

Western elites are blocking access to the platform of fuel and energy technologies to undesirable countries, as they cannot cope with competition, the president pointed out.

"Western elites believed that they could block access to these services to those countries that they dislike politically, thus putting them on the sidelines of progress, but in fact simply squeeze them out of the market. I think many people will agree with me that all these tools are used primarily as tools of unfair competition," Putin said.

The West does not want competition because it cannot cope with it, it often loses in a fair fight, the president concluded.
The countries of the Global South with high birth rates will be the leaders in economic growth, President Putin noted.

"The leaders in terms of [economic] growth rates, I want to emphasize this, namely in terms of rates, will be the states of the so-called Global South, where the GDP per capita is still low, the urbanization rate is quite low and the birth rate is high. These are primarily the countries of South and Southeast Asia, as well as Africa," he said at the plenary session.

Vladimir Putin went on to say that Russia is ready to strengthen the technological sovereignty of its partners in the energy sector.

"Russia is ready to strengthen the technological sovereignty of its partners in the energy sector by forming full-fledged scientific and production chains," he added.

BRICS sees its task in combining economic potentials, creating a space for mutually beneficial cooperation between countries.
"BRICS — Russia is chairing this organization this year — sees its task in combining economic potentials, in creating a space of opportunities for all who are interested in harmonious, mutually beneficial cooperation," Putin emphasized.

The global economic growth in the 21st century will be concentrated in BRICS countries and not in Europe or North America, Putin elaborated.

"There is an emergence of multipolar models of development that are triggering a new wave of global growth for the entirety of the 21st century ... The main growth will concentrate not in Europe and not in North America, which are gradually losing their positions in the global economy, but in the BRICS countries and in those states that want to join our group," he noted.

The president added that the countries that aspire to join BRICS see prospects in an equal world as well as in respect of the countries' national interests.

Russia embodies a fair energy transition in practice, unlike a number of Western countries that only use the green agenda, the Russian president added.

"Our energy balance is one of the greenest in the world, this is an obvious fact. And unlike some Western countries that use the climate agenda to promote their essentially neo-colonial interests, we are putting into practice a fair, orderly energy transition," he said.

Energy consumption in Russia will grow by an average of 2% per year by the end of this decade, Putin explained.

"According to estimates, by the end of this decade, energy consumption in Russia will grow by an average of 2% - this is about the same indicator as in the whole world," the president said, adding that this is clear sign of economic growth.

Russia is fulfilling its obligations to supply energy resources to the world market.

"Russia fulfills its obligations to supply energy resources to the world market and plays a stabilizing role in it," Putin said during the session, adding that energy supplies from Russia will help to balance world markets.

Russia remains one of the leading participants in the energy market despite difficulties, President Putin elaborated.

"Despite objective difficulties, they are well known to everyone, in fact, everyone has difficulties, we have our own considerable difficulties, nevertheless, Russia remains one of the leading participants in the energy market in the world," he mentioned.

Over the past two and a half years, Russian companies have been able to redirect oil and coal supplies, the president said, adding that friendly countries account for 90% of Russia's energy exports.

If the share of the Asia-Pacific region in the country's energy exports was previously approximately 39%, by the end of last year it had grown by one and a half times and already exceeded 60%, he said.

"Deliveries via the Power of Siberia gas pipeline are increasing, and exports of liquefied natural gas [LNG] continue to grow," Putin said, adding that Russia will continue to develop its technologies in the field of LNG.

https://sputnikglobe.com/20240926/ditching-the-dollar-putin-announces-work-on-independent-brics-payment-system-for-global-trade-1120296990.html