Worldcrunch
The U.S. president won’t invite South Africa to the next G20 on American soil and is cutting all funding to the country, accusing it of carrying out a genocide against Afrikaners. Official denials have changed nothing — Donald Trump is continuing to pursue South Africa with his absurd vendetta.
Billions in investment, soaring room rates, and hasty construction mark Brazil’s bid to put the Amazon at the center of climate diplomacy.
Donald Trump says he will hike tariffs on Brazil unless it halts prosecution of the country’s former right-wing leader Jair Bolsonaro. Only, Brazil exports relatively little to the U.S. and Trump’s meddling could be boosting his socialist nemesis, President Lula da Silva.
Some 17 years since its founding, BRICS+ (now including Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, the UAE and Indonesia — beyond founding members Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) continues to struggle with delivering on its promise to reform global governance and represent the Global South.
In another sign of changing power relations in the ‘post-Western’ world, the BRICS group of emerging economies could frustrate the United States’ bid to sink communism in Cuba by strangling its economy.
The emerging geopolitical paradigm is one of a kind of “armed peace” led by states equipped with nuclear weapons as the ultimate guarantee of security. The battlefield now spans the range of hybrid threats and technological breakthroughs, introducing the potential for “strategic surprises.”
In not condemning Russia and openly siding with Israel, India’s foreign policy establishment is merely jettisoning the thin layer of politically-expedient, feel-good idealistic post-colonialism that veils an iron-fisted pragmatism.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pushed ahead a deal negotiated via Qatar, for a four-day truce and an exchange of 50 hostages for 150 Palestinian prisoners. Though the humanitarian and political pressure was mounting, Israel’s all-out assault is suddenly halted, with unforeseen consequences for the future.
Frustrated by the United States’ unwavering support for Israel’s war on Gaza, Arab governments have looked at other options to help establish a ceasefire before it becomes too late. First stop: Beijing. Moscow’s role may be more obscure, but no less essential, in building a global coalition that counters the West’s stance.
There will be no Vladimir Putin or Xi Jinping at this weekend’s summit of the world’s 20 leading economies in New Delhi: a symbol of the fragmentation of the world that has accelerated since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The BRICS economies’ inclusion of new members like Iran may not make business sense, but it fits with the Sino-Russian strategy of drawing states of the Global South into their orbit in open confrontation with the U.S. and the rest of the West.
With the G20 in New Delhi around the corner, India risks finding itself the wrong side of history, and end up as an observer and not one of the drivers of a “once in a lifetime” change.
The West is losing influence on many fronts, embodied in the rise of the BRICS alliance as a kind of “counter-G7.” But Western leaders will need to decide if they want to be part of this change, or its victim.
The war in Ukraine has become globalized, with its effects being felt from Africa to China. The only hope of de-escalation is in a potential diplomatic summit between the U.S. and China this autumn.
The creation of a new common currency will be one of the main questions on the agenda at the BRICS summit in South Africa in August. But there are still many obstacles to overcome before breaking free from the almighty dollar.
The Spief, the political-economic forum dear to the Russian president, takes place this weekend in Saint Petersburg. The West will be absent, as the Kremlin increasingly appears beholden to Beijing.
The Brazilian president, back in power after more than a decade later, has not lost his vision of a post-Western world in which the BRICS would occupy a central place. Lula’s visit to Beijing puts such a vision front and center on the global agenda.
After weeks of raging battles, it appears Severodonetsk is set to fall under full control of Russian forces. The governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Haidai wrote on Telegram that Ukrainian forces will have to withdraw from the strategic city in southeastern Ukraine. Stay up-to-date with the latest on the Russia-Ukraine war, with our exclusive […]
Russian President Vladimir Putin is being hosted (virtually) by China, along with Brazil, India and South Africa, as Europe is set to offer precious EU candidate status to Ukraine.
The West is in relative decline, especially compared to Asia, but no obvious alternative ‘system’ has emerged.
China’s President Xi Jinping is featured three times on today’s front page of Chinese state-owned newspaper People’s Daily. Xi arrived in Ufa, Russia on Wednesday for a flurry of diplomatic activity ahead of the BRICS and Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summits. The Chinese leader is pictured shaking hands with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Indian […]
-Analysis- BUENOS AIRES — As China extends its investment reach to just about every corner of the globe, the enormous amounts of capital at play are transforming economic and strategic relations the world over. Latin America is one of the Asian giant’s key investment targets. But of all the region’s countries, only Brazil appears to […]
RIO DE JANEIRO — The sign outside this modest hair salon in the Rio das Pedras favela, or shantytown, of Rio de Janeiro reads “Belos Fios” (“beautiful hair”). Inside, customers can find Matrix hair color products stacked behind the salon’s two only chairs. This is just one of some 30 small salons, most of them […]
-OpEd- PARIS — Here we are amid a global rise in military conflicts and political tensions — wars in the Middle East, Ukraine, the exclusion of Russia from the G8, conflicts in the South China Sea, Argentina’s debt default, among others. A century after the start of World War I, the planet seems to have […]
In a gloomy new book, two French economists argue that the current state of global finance make conditions ripe not just for regional conflicts, but for a new world war.
Media in emerging economies must start to challenge the dominant voice of the Western press, argues Xinhua News Agency chief Li Congjun in a guest column for America Economía.
SÂO PAULO — The Chinese government is already making its first plans to celebrate the centenary of two momentous events in the country’s history. Seven years from now, in 2021, the nation will mark the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China. Then in 2049, the country will celebrate the creation […]
Monday, July 14, 2014 GAZA STRIKES CONTINUE AS OFFENSIVE ENTERS 7TH DAY The Israeli army continues to launch air strikes in Gaza, while more rockets are fired towards Israel, as the open conflict reaches its seventh day. At least 172 Palestinians are reported killed with more than 1,100 wounded. The United Nations said that 17,000 […]
NEW DELHI – Dreaming with BRICs, the study published in 2003 by Goldman Sachs that traced the rise of four emerging economies (Brazil, Russia, India and China) also marked the birth of a concept that has yet to disappoint. Between 2004 and 2011, average growth in China was 10.8%, in India 8.3% — to mention […]
Some skeptics, though, wonder whether all the enthusiasm for the developing world has created a sort of emerging market “bubble”.
In Aesop’s Fables, the story about the race between the hare and the tortoise tells people that the rabbit’s complacency and the turtle’s perseverance resulted in an unexpected ending to a seemingly predictable contest. In the 21st century, will the economic race between China and India also offer similar twists and turns, notably because of […]
CALCUTTA– Captain Manpreet Jolly has not quite recovered yet. Nothing in his career at the Haldia port authority had prepared him for this. The captain was abducted by masked men in the middle of the night, and told at gunpoint to leave and never return to the port town. “We were at my assistant’s house […]
-Analysis- In the financial press, Africa is now hailed as the “go-to” continent. It seems to be at the cusp of a golden age: its growth and direct foreign investment rates recall those of China at the beginning of the 2000s; South Africa has become one of the booming BRICS (Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa). The continent also […]
SÃO PAULO – Brazil is the most expensive developing nation for doing business and has costs similar to developed countries, according to a study by consulting firm KPMG. “Competitive Alternatives” is a regular KPMG report that compares the structure of costs for companies in different countries and localities, taking into account taxes, labor, rent, cost […]