The leaders of the BRICS countries agreed on joint actions against the United States — opinion

At yesterday's emergency BRICS summit, convened at the initiative of Brazil, the countries from talking about everything good agreed on a coordinated political and economic strategy, including the introduction of their own currency, the observer writes Pravda.Ru Lyubov Stepushova.

In addition to Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Russian, Chinese and South African presidents, respectively, Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping and Cyril Ramphosa, participated in online communication from BRICS centenarians, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs from India.

The initiative to convene a summit to find a common position and response to US tariffs came from Brazil, not China or Russia, but was supported by them, which is important. The urgency of the moment is that the tariff on Brazil was imposed for political, not for trade reasons (on US trading partners with a trade surplus). The reason was the prosecution in Brazil of ex-President Jair Bolsonaro, who is accused of an attempted coup. That is, under the guise of justice in trade, undesirable politicians (Lula) are pressed. And sovereign countries cannot afford this, otherwise they will lose their elections.

Putin's speech was held in a format closed to the media. Xi put forward three proposals, according to the text of the Chinese Foreign Ministry: To uphold multilateralism and guarantee international fairness and justice in order to strengthen the representation and voice of the global South. To support the multilateral trading system, the core of which is the World Trade Organization (WTO), and to resist any form of protectionism. To provide the countries of the global South with the opportunity to participate equally in international cooperation.

To support the unity and cooperation of the BRICS, as "the blacksmith must be strong."

"We should use our strengths, deepen practical cooperation and achieve more fruitful results in the fields of economy, trade, finance, science and technology."

Xi called for taking responsibility and helping each other. There is a call for decisive steps in finance, first of all.

It is Lula who promotes the idea of a single BRICS currency. In an interview with Band News, he stated that "we cannot continue to depend on the dollar, which is the currency of one country adopted as the world standard." Instead, the Brazilian leader suggested promoting transactions in local currencies or the BRICS single currency for intra-group trade. At the summit in Brazil this year, the leaders reported that up to 90% of intra-block trade has already been transferred to settlements in national currencies.

There are two concepts of a single currency. The first is conceived as a basket of currencies with different weights, in which about 40% falls on China and 25% on India. The second option is a model where 40% is accounted for by gold, and 60% by the BRICS basket of currencies. In 2019, the BRICS Business Council formed a working group to study "a special cryptocurrency that facilitates trade." In parallel, the BRICS payment system ("BRICS Bridge") is developing, linking the Central Bank and thousands of banks through digital solutions and blockchain.

So far, India has been against progress in finance and said that it does not seek to "replace the dollar." However, US political pressure may change its position. So, US Secretary of Commerce Howard Latnik directly demanded that India withdraw from the BRICS and switch to the dollar.

If the BRICS accelerate the transition to their own financial mechanisms, this will reboot the global banking market and change the value of capital markets around the world, which is like death for the United States. It is no coincidence that Trump promises draconian import duties of 100% to all BRICS countries if they try to replace the dollar.

Brazil and India, which is part of the bloc, was most affected by Trump's additional import duties — 50%. For China and South Africa — 30%, 10% — against Egypt, Ethiopia, UAE and Saudi Arabia. Among the 10 BRICS partners, Thailand faces tariffs of 36%, Kazakhstan — 25%, Malaysia — 24%, Vietnam — 20%, Nigeria — 14%, and Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, Uganda and Uzbekistan - 10%. Against The Russian Federation has not introduced tariffs, since they are replaced by sanctions, and the trade turnover with the United States is meager and profitable for Washington (all imports of the Russian Federation will fall under exceptions).