Chinese President Xi Jinping yesterday acknowledged growing doubts over the relevance of the five-nation “BRICS” bloc of large emerging economies, but called for the group to stick together even after China’s tense border row with fellow member India.
Xi is to host the ninth annual BRICS summit today in Xiamen under the shadow of the border row and a North Korean hydrogen bomb blast.
In a speech yesterday, Xi alluded to questions hanging over the bloc, whose disparate members are preoccupied with political and economic problems at home.
“Some people, seeing that emerging markets and developing countries have experienced growth setbacks, assert that BRICS countries are losing their luster,” Xi said.
“BRICS countries have encountered headwinds of varying intensity,” he said, but added that the bloc remained “fully confident.”
The BRICS are Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
Lumping together far-flung and vastly different political and economic systems, BRICS has long been viewed by many as contrived, with few commonalities or significant achievements.
“It’s really tough to see how BRICS is any type of coherent anything. What do they have in common?” Peking University economics professor Christopher Balding said. “Economically, trade-wise, financially, they all do things very differently.”
While China is an economic powerhouse and India is rising, the Russian, Brazilian and South African economies have been hit hard by weak prices of export commodities.
Meanwhile, Brazilian President Michel Temer and South African President Jacob Zuma are distracted by political turmoil at home.
Nuclear-armed China and India avoided a full-blown crisis when they last week backed away from a protracted standoff over a disputed Himalayan region — perhaps to avoid sullying the summit.
However, the encounter left a bitter aftertaste.
In his speech, Xi said the need for BRICS members to show mutual respect and “avoid conflicts,” but otherwise did not mention the border dispute.
India and China also are divided over China’s ally Pakistan, which Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi — who is to also attend the summit — has labeled a fount of terrorism.
Intra-BRICS trade is heavily tilted in China’s favor, fueling complaints from fellow members. India alone has lodged several trade cases against China this year.
Perhaps BRICS’ biggest success was last year’s establishment of the Shanghai-based New Development Bank, envisioned as the developing world’s World Bank, but many economists doubt it will be influential.
“BRICS envisioned quite a hopeful direction for the future, but so far has had very limited influence on world politics and economics,” Renmin University international relations professor Shi Yinhong said. |
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