Source : INDIA TODAY NEWS
In September 2023, India pulled off a feat at the G20 Summit that diplomats had written off as practically impossible – getting all members, including Russia and the West, to sign a consensus declaration at the height of the Ukraine war. This weekend, three years later, as India chairs the BRICS Summit, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his team will look to pull off a balancing act that will be even tougher.
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Over two days, ‘fortress’ Bharat Mandapam will host leaders from 11 BRICS countries, including China’s Xi Jinping, who will be back in India after seven years, and Russia’s Vladimir Putin. Among the guests will be countries directly at war with each other- Iran, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia.
At the same time, the eyes of a mercurial Donald Trump will be fixed on the mega summit. The US President has viewed BRICS as a challenge to American economic and strategic interests. While Trump will not be at the table, he may still be the largest invisible elephant in the room. Amid turbulent India-US ties, New Delhi will have to walk a tightrope to ensure that BRICS initiatives do not irritate Trump.
That’s a whole lot of balancing act to do for PM Modi during the weekend.
A TOUGHER TEST THAN G20
Three years ago, India navigated a diplomatic minefield to reach a consensus between the G7 countries and the Russia-China bloc on the Ukraine conflict. While it did not explicitly condemn Russia, the declaration called on members to uphold territorial integrity, stressing that “today’s era must not be of war”.
The BRICS Summit presents a different challenge. Another war (the US-Iran conflict) is raging in the background, which has upended global energy supplies. The summit will bring Iran, UAE and Saudi Arabia – countries directly affected by the same war – under one roof.
Both UAE and Saudi Arabia have faced the brunt of Iran’s retaliatory strikes across the Gulf amid its conflict with the US. Just a week back, the UAE intercepted a barrage of Iranian drones fired towards an airbase, while fighting has intensified between Saudi Arabian forces and Iran-backed Houthis.
On the other hand, the war has laid bare deep geopolitical divisions. Amid declining trust in the US, Saudi Arabia has moved closer to Pakistan and Turkiye through the NATO-style Makkah Joint Defence Agreement.
The BRICS Summit will bring Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, UAE’s Crown Prince, and Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister face to face.
This puts India in an unusually delicate position. While Iran is expected to nudge the bloc to take a strong stand against the American military offensive, the UAE and Saudi Arabia are likely to seek a condemnation of Tehran’s strikes across the Gulf.
While India and Iran share deep cultural and historic ties, it has close strategic relationships with Saudi Arabia and the UAE. This is where India’s juggling act will be tested to find a consensus.
The difficulties were evident earlier this year. The BRICS Foreign Ministers’ meeting in May concluded without a joint statement, largely due to differences between Iran and the UAE over the Middle East turmoil.
According to a report in The Indian Express, India is working with Russia and Egypt in back-channel negotiations to bridge differences between Iran and Saudi Arabia and the UAE to salvage the joint declaration.
THE SHADOW OF BISHKEK
Complicating matters further is the timing.
Just two weeks ago, India signed the Bishkek declaration at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit that explicitly condemned the strikes on Iran and backed Tehran’s right to a peaceful nuclear program.
It was a marked shift in the stance of India, which remained conspicuously silent as the war began in February this year.
Now, India cannot afford to let its BRICS chairmanship be interpreted as an endorsement of any one camp.
Speaking at the India Today BRICS Roundtable, former G20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant stressed that India must act as a “mature, seasoned player” during its BRICS presidency and ensure the grouping is not seen as taking an anti-Western stance.
“It is necessary for India to work simultaneously with the US, Europe, and China,” Kant said.
The sentiment was echoed by BJP vice president Ram Madhav, who asserted that a new world order was on the horizon and India would have to “play a balanced role”.
COUNTERING ANTI-WEST NARRATIVE
Over the years, India has tried to present BRICS as an important forum for the ‘Global South’, steering away from the narrative that it is an anti-West bloc.
However, Russia and China have increasingly challenged the US-led international order. Here’s a reality check. Russia remains under extensive Western sanctions. China is locked in a trade war with the US. Iran has faced decades of US sanctions and is now directly at war with Washington.
This is where the BRICS summit becomes particularly important for India. Not only has New Delhi deepened its strategic relationship with Washington, but it also has strong defence and energy ties with Moscow.
This will be another balancing act that India will have to pull off tactfully so as not to infuriate Trump, who has voiced his scepticism of BRICS several times.
Last year, Trump went on a ranting spree, threatening BRICS countries with tariffs of 100% if they sought to create a currency to replace the dollar. Later that year, he threatened additional tariffs on countries aligning themselves with what he called the “anti-American policies” of BRICS.
Since then, India has clarified that BRICS was not seeking to create a separate currency to compete with the US dollar. Instead, it has reframed it as a call for efforts to settle bilateral trade in national currencies.
“BRICS needs to say we are not anti-West, but anti-imperialism,” top American economist Jeffrey Sachs told India Today.
CAN BRICS REACH A CONSENSUS?
Over the decades, India’s approach has been to work with multiple power centres without endorsing any one camp. But as it chairs the 18th BRICS Summit, India will have to walk a delicate tightrope.
On one side is its strategic partnership with the US and growing engagement with other Western powers like France and the UK. On the other are Russia and China, which are increasingly seeking to reshape the global order. Then, there is Iran, whose conflict with the US has engulfed Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
Former ambassador Anil Trigunayat told India Today that India has weathered many such storms, including during its G20 and previous BRICS presidencies.
“India’s leadership and diplomatic prowess should be able to draft a declaration acceptable to all members, including the parties in conflict. Moreover, there has been a consensus across all other 22 ministerial verticals and 100-odd working groups and subgroups,” he told IndiaToday.in.
India does not need to take sides at BRICS. But it has to make sure the consensus statement does not appear to force it into a camp. That is the balancing act New Delhi cannot escape this weekend.
– Ends
SOURCE :- TIMES OF INDIA
