JOHANNESBURG — Leaders of some of the developing world’s most important economies turned Wednesday to the main business of their summit in South Africa, a day after a speech by Russian President Vladimir Putin gave the gathering an anti-Western tinge that officials had been hoping to avoid.
Four of the bloc’s leaders are in Johannesburg for the group’s first in-person meeting since the COVID-19 pandemic, including Chinese President Xi Jinping. Putin is not attending after an International Criminal Court arrest warrant for him over the war in Ukraine complicated his travel to South Africa, but he was participating virtually.
In the buildup to the three days of talks in Johannesburg, BRICS officials had pushed back at suggestions the bloc was taking an anti-Western turn under the influence of Russia and China. Putin’s address put the deteriorating geopolitical climate at the center of the gathering. There appears to be momentum for expansion, with all five leaders backing the move in principle, although the exact criteria new members might need to meet to join must still be ironed out.
Alongside expansion, there’s also talk by the BRICS members of adopting a broad economic policy that seeks a move away from U.S. dollar-based trade within the bloc.