Russian Press Review - TASS World Service
PRESS REVIEW
MOSCOW, August 22. /TASS/. BRICS group faces pivotal decision on expansion as Johannesburg summit kicks off; Trump, boasting healthy lead over rivals in polls, to skip first GOP primary debate; and US, Japan and Australia planning joint naval drills in South China Sea. These stories topped Tuesday’s newspaper headlines across Russia.
Vedomosti: Future of BRICS hinges on summit’s choice of expansion option
At the 15th summit of BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa), which kicks off in Johannesburg on August 22, a pivotal decision may be made on expanding the club. As the South African Foreign Ministry said earlier, 23 countries have submitted official applications to join BRICS. On August 21, South African Foreign Ministry Spokesman Nelson Kgwete told TASS that, altogether, the leaders of more than 40 countries will participate in the summit. Russian President Vladimir Putin will participate in the event via video link, while Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will be onsite to represent Russia in person.
The main candidates for expansion are Saudi Arabia and Indonesia, thinks Yaroslav Lisovolik, Russian International Affairs Council member and founder of the BRICS+ Analytics company. He explained that out of all the Global South regions, only the Middle East and Southeast Asia are unrepresented among BRICS member states.
Lisovolik stressed that insinuations about China’s aspiration to turn BRICS into an antipode of the G7 are groundless. "China, possibly, will support the fostering of interaction with various institutions with Western participation via BRICS+," the expert opined. That said, he did not rule out the possibility that the organization’s current makeup may remain the same while those countries that applied for membership may join an allied formation, say, the "Friends of BRICS" group or BRICS+. Lisovolik noted that expanding the core membership of the club would create certain difficulties, above all pertaining to the ability to reach a consensus on key issues, such as introducing a shared currency, for example.
The main advantage of BRICS expansion is that it would serve to confirm the organization’s global nature, thus placing it alongside the G20 and G7, Timofey Bordachev, academic supervisor at the Center for Comprehensive European and International Studies at the Higher School of Economics (HSE University), said. He also noted the shortcomings of this path, which would stem from the complications that expansion would introduce in the decision-making process. "The participation of Brazil and South Africa, for example, already adds certain difficulties since they are less resolved to alter the world order than Russia and China," the expert noted. That said, Bordachev clarified that BRICS represents a rather democratic interaction format, while stressing that Sino-Indian differences of opinion represent the biggest weak point in the entire "non-West" in general, and within the BRICS group in particular.
Media: Trump way ahead of rivals in polls, to skip Republican debate
Former US President Donald Trump has made a risky decision for an American presidential candidate by refusing to participate in debates with his rivals for the Republican Party nomination, at least in the first debate round to be held this week. According to Trump, he already has an indisputable edge over other GOP presidential candidates. While it is possible that this is just a typical show of Trumpian bravado, it could also be that Trump himself may fear that h...
ТАСС 22.08.2023, 10:01 MSK