BRICS: An expanding platform that has evolved as significant global force

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi will welcome leaders from the expanded BRICS member-countries here as India hosts the 18th BRICS Leaders' Summit this weekend.

India officially assumed the BRICS Chairmanship for 2026, taking over from Brazil in the beginning of this year.

Visiting heads of the 11 BRICS member-countries will meet on Saturday, while leaders from partner countries and outreach invitees will join the summit programme on Sunday.

Though New Delhi had extended an invitation, Bangladesh is yet to confirm its participation or send a government representative to the BRICS Summit with State Minister for Foreign Affairs Humaiun Kobir reportedly saying on Thursday that Prime Minister Tarique Rahman was not invited to the summit and the invitation instead extended to the current BIMSTEC Chair.

BIMSTEC is a regional organisation of seven South and Southeast Asian countries aimed at promoting economic, technical, and strategic cooperation around the Bay of Bengal.

Incidentally, few groupings have attracted as much attention perhaps as has BRICS, the coalition of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.

The grouping was formalised at the first meeting of BRIC Foreign Ministers on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York in 2006, with the inaugural BRIC Summit convened in Yekaterinburg, Russia, three years later with Brazil, India, and China joining the host.  It was agreed to expand into BRICS with the inclusion of South Africa at the BRIC Foreign Ministers' meeting in New York in 2010.

Accordingly, South Africa attended the 3rd BRICS Summit in Sanya on the island of Hainan, China, in April 2011. Together, the five nations represent more than 40 per cent of the world's population and nearly a quarter of global GDP. (IANS)

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