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Cake day: July 1st, 2023

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  • 10 developments at the BRICS meeting yesterday some of which western media will probably not report. Make of them what you will.

    1. US Presidential candidate Donald Trump and Russian leader Vladimir Putin said they would end the war in Ukraine. Speaking at the BRICS conference which ended yesterday, Putin said he welcomed Donald Trump’s pledge and “believed it was sincere.”

    2. China’s leader Xi Jinping and India’s head Narendra Modi committed to ending their countries’ long-term but mostly non-violent border dispute, striking a huge blow against American attempts to divide the two Asian giants.

    3. BRICS membership growth continued to accelerate, with Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates declared members this week, Turkey next in line, and others applying. BRICS already has more than 40 per cent of humanity and 35 per cent of global GDP.

    4. Despite internet misinformation on currency (it is NOT true that 159 countries signed up for a BRICS currency), it IS true that innovations, including a digital currency project called m-Bridge, will de-dollarise the global cross-border payments system in the long term.

    5. The massive turnout of world leaders at BRICS showed that the US plan to isolate Russia had failed—and, with poetic justice, the failure coincided with a year in which the US itself was repeatedly isolated from the world in multiple United Nations votes over the pitiless slaughter in Gaza.

    6. Modi’s declaration of the difference between BRICS and other country groupings (think NATO, QUAD, AUKUS) was startling: “We support dialogue and diplomacy, not war,” Modi said.

    7. There was obvious delight among participants that United Nations secretary-general António Guterres attended BRICS, doing his job—which was to represent the wider world of humanity, rather than the western world’s 13 per cent. He echoed the call to end fighting in Ukraine.

    8. The publication of figures showing that Russia’s economy had been far less damaged than the US intended, reinforced the belief that a significant part of global economic muscle had moved from US control to the wider, multipolar world.

    9. Delegates said the developments made the prospects of war in East Asia less likely. If the Ukraine war had failed to isolate and weaken Russia, the US would think twice about repeating the strategy using the island of Taiwan to isolate and weaken China.

    10. China’s leader Xi Jinping pointed out that “the common march of the Global South towards modernity is a major event in world history”. He also said that BRICS, as a huge bloc of anti-war nations working together could only be a force for stability in the world— much needed.