14 May 2026 08:39 BST
The Strait of Hormuz is open to all commercial ships if they coordinate with Iran’s naval forces, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Thursday.
The minister is currently attending the Brics foreign ministers’ meeting in New Delhi.
India is hosting the BRICS Foreign Ministers’ Meeting on May 14-15 under its current presidency of the grouping, with foreign ministers and senior representatives from member and partner countries expected to attend. The meeting is being viewed as a key preparatory exercise ahead of the 18th BRICS Summit scheduled in New Delhi in September.
(February 26, 2026)
The timing of the visit was notable. It came months before contentious Israeli elections and as Netanyahu’s international standing has deteriorated amid allegations of war crimes, UN accusations of genocide and an ICC arrest warrant for Netanyahu and his former defence minister Yoav Gallant.
(March 3, 2026)
With more than three days since Israel killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as well as more than 550 others – including at least 165 children – the bloc, touted as a leader of the Global South, is nowhere to be found.
(April 17, 2026)
Great powers emerge in crises, and BRICS may have just missed their moment. While the war involving Iran could have marked a turning point, the bloc remained silent, unable to display a common position. This silence questions its real credibility in the face of its global ambitions. Behind the image of a counter-power to the West, this sequence above all exposes deep divisions and structural fragilities that rhetoric is no longer enough to mask.
(June 18, 2025)
While Israeli strikes target sensitive Iranian sites and Tehran responds with missiles on Tel Aviv, the military escalation is redefining balances in the Middle East. However, a strategic absence intrigues: that of the BRICS. As a new member of the bloc, Iran was counting on solid support against its arch-enemy. Yet neither Moscow, Beijing, nor New Delhi are committing. This silence exposes the limits of an alliance that Tehran viewed as a counterweight to Western hegemony.
(archive entries)
Our paths will meet again at the G20 Summit, in Rio de Janeiro, and at COP 30, in Belém. The presence of the African Union as a full member of the G20 will be of great value—but including more countries from the continent as full members is still also necessary. We have common agendas to defend.
It is unacceptable that a world capable of generating wealth in the order of USD 100 trillion dollars per year still harbors the hunger of more than 735 million people. We are creating the Global Alliance against Hunger at the G20 so as to promote a set of public policies and mobilize resources to finance them.
Around 60 countries—many of them in Africa—are coming close to financial insolvency, allocating more resources to paying external debt than to education or health. This reflects the obsolete nature of financial institutions such as the IMF and the World Bank, which often worsen crises that they should be resolving.
On a visit to Ethiopia, Brazilian President Luís Inácio Lula da Silva said Sunday (Feb. 18) that Brazil has a historical debt to Africa and advocated that the countries of the Global South step up their relations. He traveled to attend the 37th African Union Summit, which brought together heads of state and members of government from the 54 countries of the African continent. As a guest, President Lula took the opportunity to hold meetings and bolster bilateral ties.
At the Tel Aviv press conference, Netanyahu is asked by a reporter why he did not withdraw from the Oslo Accords, given that he keeps criticizing them.
“I inherited the Oslo Accords,” he says. “The decision to bring the PLO from Tunis, and plant it in the heart of Judea and Samaria [West Bank], and in Gaza, was a decision made and implemented before I became prime minister. I thought it was a terrible mistake and I still do.”
Turning on the reporter, he says: “You and your journalist friends have been blaming me for almost 30 years for putting the brakes on the Oslo Accords, and preventing the Palestinian state. That’s true,” he says.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa told Tuesday‘s talks that diplomats did not have sufficient time to draft a declaration.
(August 30, 2023)
Policymakers in Washington and the Middle East have been busy talking about the possibility of Saudi Arabia normalizing its ties with Israel in return, in part, for a formal defense pact with the United States. Receiving far less attention is a critical question, at least for Riyadh: Would such a move jeopardize Saudi Arabia’s recent diplomatic accord with Iran?
(August 28, 2023)
There is increasing talk of a United States-brokered “grand bargain” on Middle East security, the core of which would be normalization of ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia. It isn’t clear what motivates Joe Biden to press for this deal now. The obvious goal would involve the eternal search for peace in the Middle East, but there are hints that such a bargain may have more to do with keeping the Saudis out of China’s orbit. One thing we know, Biden’s lieutenants are lobbying hard in the Senate for acceptance of some version of far-reaching demands from the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, among them access to uranium enrichment technology that would ostensibly provide fuel for future Saudi nuclear power plants. Indeed, enrichment is a step in the production of nuclear reactor fuel. It is also a vital part of one of two paths to the atomic bomb.
„As the global community moves towards multipolarity, we desperately need – and I have been vigorously advocating for – a strengthened and reformed multilateral architecture based on the UN Charter and international law.“ – António Guterres, Secretary General of the United Nations, speaking at the 15th BRICS summit in Johannesburg, South Africa.
„Wir bewegen uns auf eine multipolare Welt zu und das ist eine positive Sache“, fügte er hinzu. Er verlangte zudem die uneingeschränkte Achtung des Völkerrechts und der Menschenrechte.
Es sei eine gravierende Ungerechtigkeit, dass afrikanische Länder im Schnitt viermal mehr für Kredite zahlten als die USA und achtmal mehr als die reichsten europäischen Länder, sagte Guterres und forderte die Entwicklung eines wirksamen Schuldentilgungsmechanismus.
BRICS chair president Cyril Ramaphosa made the announcement at the closing of the Summit on Thursday morning at the Sandton Convention Centre.
“We have decided to invite the Argentine Republic, the Arab Republic of Egypt, the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to become full members of BRICS.
“The membership will take effect from 1 January 2024.
BRICS officials and foreign ministers have been working on the criteria for membership, according to South Africa’s Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Naledi Pandor, and will draft recommendations to be considered by the BRICS leaders during the summit.
Pandor had earlier announced that 23 nations have formally applied to be part of the bloc.
Dethrone the dollar, the symbol of Western hegemony. As ambitious as it is complex, this objective will be one of those addressed at the summit of BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) from Tuesday, August 22 to Thursday, August 24 in Johannesburg, South Africa.
The heads of state in attendance (South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, his Chinese and Brazilian counterparts Xi Jinping and Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov) will also be discussing the expansion of their bloc to include other countries, particularly African ones.
The European conflict, the global economic crisis, the balkanization of the African continent with half a dozen conflicts, including the civil war in Sudan and the imminent intervention in Niger, add new challenges to the bloc‘s development and sustainability strategies.
5 countries make up the BRICS so far, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Today they are meeting to discuss various issues of integration and collaboration, highlighting the prospect of expanding their member states and updating financial cooperation.
Seit 1975 hat Kuba die Kräfte der Regierung der Volksbewegung zur Befreiung Angolas (Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola, MPLA) unter der Führung von Agostino Neto bei der Bewahrung der Unabhängigkeit entscheidend unterstützt. Rund 300.000 Kubaner nahmen an der Seite der Angolaner an diesem Kampf teil, 2.855 kamen bei Gefechten ums Leben, 204 weitere bei der Erfüllung ziviler Aufgaben.
Dieser findet vom 22. bis 24. August in Johannesburg unter dem Motto „Brics und Afrika: Partnerschaft für wechselseitig beschleunigtes Wachstum, nachhaltige Entwicklung und inklusiven Multilateralismus“ statt. Südafrika hat derzeit den Vorsitz des Bündnisses inne.
Parallel zum Gipfeltreffen der Staats-und Regierungschefs der Mitgliedsstaaten Brasilien, Russland, Indien, China und Südafrika werden der „Brics-Plus-Dialog“ und der „Brics-Africa-Outreach“ stattfinden. Diese Veranstaltungen beziehen Nationen aus dem Globalen Süden und dem afrikanischen Kontinent ein.
On Wednesday, Russia said it did not tell South Africa that arresting Putin on a warrant from the ICC would mean “war”.
South Africa is due to host a summit of Brics nations – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – next month. But the ICC has an arrest warrant out for Putin, accusing him of the war crime of deporting Ukrainian children to Russia. South Africa, as an ICC member, is obliged to arrest him should he appear in person at the summit.
One gets the impression that Karaganov believes that the West can be stopped by a local and demonstrative “use of nuclear weapons”. But there is no comprehension of the consequences. And it’s not just the military but also the geopolitical component that is at stake. All those who are neutral or sympathetic to Russia today will turn their backs. The West is very much in favor of such Russian behavior. So why does the author suggest doing what is in the West’s interest? (…)
The US and NATO are pumping equipment and ammunition into Europe. They are increasing their involvement in Ukraine. They desperately need a move by Russia to isolate it on the world stage.
And then, like an egg delivered on Easter Sunday, comes Sergey Karaganov’s article. Coincidence or part of a pattern?
Following his visit to China on Saturday, UAE President Muhammad bin Zayed al-Nahyan met with Brazilian President Lula de Silva to explore a potential cooperative mediation effort for Russia‘s conflict in Ukraine with China.
Lula, der sich zuvor drei Tage lang in Peking aufhielt, besuchte am Samstag und Sonntag die VAE. Er habe mit seinen Amtskollegen Mohammed bin Zayid al Nahyan und Xi Jinping über die Schaffung einer Gruppe von Ländern ähnlich der G20 gesprochen, um im Konflikt zwischen Russland und der Ukraine zu vermitteln, erklärte er gegenüber Medienvertretern.
(15.04.2023)
Earlier, on Thursday, the PT member will attend the inauguration of former president Dilma Rousseff at the BRICS Development Bank, in Shanghai. Lula wants investment in new productive assets and infrastructure, including railroads and hydroelectric plants, while his Chinese counterpart demands Brazil‘s formal entry into the Belt and Road Initiative, which completes ten years in September.