Pakistan’s ambassador to Russia Mohammad Khalid Jamali applied to join BRICS in November last year.
Pakistan had the support of China. Russia also supported Pakistan’s application.
Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk said in a press conference with Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar last month, “We are happy that Pakistan has applied for BRICS membership. BRICS and Shanghai Cooperation Organization are friendly organizations. We will support Pakistan’s membership.”
Overchuk had said, “BRICS has expanded in the last few years. Countries from all over the world are showing interest in joining it. We have a very good relationship with Pakistan.”
BRICS was founded in 2006 by Brazil, Russia, India and China. South Africa joined this group in 2011.
In January 2024, Egypt, Iran, Ethiopia, and UAE were made members of BRICS. Although Saudi Arabia was also invited to join, it has not yet been able to do so.
Pakistan faces failure
Pakistan probably already knew that India would not agree to its membership. This became clear from what PM Modi said in the closing session of the 16th BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia on Wednesday. PM Modi said that India welcomes new members of BRICS, but every decision related to it should be taken unanimously.
India is the founding country of BRICS and India’s consent is necessary to include any new member. PM Modi has made India’s stand clear regarding the expansion of BRICS. PM Modi said, “The process and principle that we accepted in Johannesburg should be followed.”
More than 30 countries have shown interest in joining BRICS. These include Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Turkey, Malaysia, Azerbaijan and Colombia. India’s relations with Pakistan are historically bad. There are not even diplomatic relations between the two countries.
The second important thing is that India will avoid including countries in BRICS that are loyal to China. The relations between Pakistan and China are not hidden from anyone. India does not want BRICS to become a platform where China dominates.
Pakistan’s English newspaper Dawn has written that the tension on the border between China and India is decreasing, in such a situation the path to BRICS can be easy for Pakistan. Pakistan hopes that if the relations between China and India are good then India can be convinced in the matter of Pakistan.
Who stopped Pakistan?
Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch said in a press conference in Islamabad, “We hope that Pakistan’s request will be considered and this is necessary if BRICS has to be made inclusive.”
BRICS partner countries have also been announced in the Kazan Summit and Pakistan’s name is not in it either. Algeria, Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Nigeria, Thailand, Turkey, Uganda, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam have been included as BRICS partner countries.
Rana Ahsan Afzal Khan of Pakistan Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif’s team said on not getting BRICS membership, “Pakistan is optimistic about joining BRICS. I believe that Pakistan will be a part of BRICS shortly. BRICS is a platform for the world’s big economies. Pakistan is going to increase oil imports from Russia.”
When Russia supported Pakistan’s membership in September last year, Derek Grossman, Indo-Pacific analyst at the think tank Rand Corporation, wrote, “When Russia added India to the SCO, China included Pakistan in it. Now Russia is supporting Pakistan in BRICS at the cost of India and it is obvious that China will benefit from Pakistan joining BRICS.”
When there was talk of including UAE, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, and Saudi Arabia in BRICS, it was also said that China is getting new members included as per its own wishes.
Who is uncomfortable with Modi’s speech
In August 2023, strategic affairs expert Brahma Chellaney wrote, ”It seems that the inclusion of new members has the stamp of China, which is expanding BRICS aggressively with the support of Russia. Just like China allowed India to join SCO only with Pakistan, similarly, now in the pair of rivals in BRICS, apart from India and China, there will be two new geopolitical rivals: Iran and Saudi Arabia.”
Chellaney believed that India does not have any problem with the UAE, but Iran and Saudi Arabia will be with China and not India in the hour of the test.
Tanvi Madan, Senior Fellow of Think Tank Brookings Institute, believes that the things said by PM Modi in the closing speech of the BRICS Summit in Kazan were not going to please Russia and China.
Tanvi Madan has shared PM Modi’s closing speech and wrote, “It is natural for the Modi-Xi meeting to get attention, but what PM Modi said in the closing speech of BRICS is very interesting. PM Modi has outlined in his speech what India wants from BRICS but at the same time he also expressed his concerns about what China and Russia want to do.”
PM Modi said many things in his closing speech, which would have been uncomfortable for Putin and Xi Jinping.
PM Modi said that BRICS should raise its voice for reform in international institutions. India is demanding permanent membership in the UNSC, but China does not support it.
PM Modi said that India supports dialogue and diplomacy and not war. Russia has attacked Ukraine and in 2020, Chinese soldiers also had a violent clash with Indian soldiers in Galwan.
PM Modi said that we should speak in one voice in the fight against terrorism and the financing of terrorism. There should not be double standards on such issues. When India tried many times to get Sajid Mir of Lashkar, associated with the 26/11 Mumbai attack, declared a terrorist in the United Nations, China stopped it.
PM Modi said that a clear message should go from BRICS that BRICS is not a dividing organization but an organization working in the interest of humanity. Narendra Modi also said that BRICS is not meant to usurp the place of global institutions but advocates reform in them.
Russia and China call global institutions like the United Nations and the World Bank pro-West organizations. In such a situation, Modi’s statement from the BRICS platform would not have been pleasant for Xi Jinping and Putin.
PM Modi said that all decisions should be taken unanimously and the founding members of BRICS should be respected. It is obvious that China and Russia wanted to include Pakistan in BRICS but India did not want it.
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