Tajikistan President Emomali Rahmon has left on a working visit to Kazan, the capital of Russia’s Tatarstan Republic, to attend in the BRICS summit.
The Tajik president’s official website says the First Deputy Prime Minister, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, President’s Foreign Affairs Adviser, the Minister of Industry and New Technologies, the Head of the State Committee on Investment and State-owned Property Management and some other high-ranking state officials are accompanying Emomali Rahmon on his visit to Kazan.
Some sources say Tajik leader is expected to hold a number of bilateral meetings on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Kazan.
Meanwhile, media reports say leaders of BRICS member countries – including Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chinese President Xi Jinping and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa – are attending the alliance summit in Kazan.
UAE President Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed reportedly also arrived in Kazan for the summit.
Al Jazeera reports that leaders of several other countries that have shown an interest in deepening ties with BRICS are also participating, including Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is also attending – and is expected to meet Putin on Thursday.
According to Al Jazeera, the central theme that unites BRICS members is their disillusionment with Western-led institutions of global governance, especially when it comes to the economy.
The sanctions imposed on Russia after its 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine have spooked many Global South nations, worried that the West could weaponize tools of global finance against them.
To that end, BRICS partners reportedly want to reduce their dependence on the US dollar and the SWIFT system, an international messaging network for financial transactions that Russian banks were cut off from in 2022.
According to RIA Novosti, Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov says Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold a news conference following the BRICS summit on Thursday.
Delegations from 36 countries – 22 of them represented by heads of state – and six international organizations are present in Kazan, Ushakov said.
According to him, Putin is meeting with Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan today.
Putin already met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping yesterday.
Analysts say the BRICS summit in Kazan, which leaders from two dozen nations are attending, is the largest event Russia has hosted in years and a signal to the West amid the war in Ukraine.
The 2024 BRICS summit currently taking place in Kazan from 22 to 24 October is the sixteenth annual BRICS summit. This is the first BRICS summit to include Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates following their accession to the organization at the 15th BRICS summit.
BRICS stands for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
The group started in 2006, and Brazil, Russia, India and China convened for the first BRIC summit in 2009. South Africa joined the group a year later.
The aim of the alliance is to challenge the economic and political monopoly of the West. The group sets priorities and has discussions once every year during the summit, which members take turns hosting.
