The Indian government says it is not opposed to expanding the membership of BRICS, but that the criteria for admitting new members must be clearly defined.

Indian external affairs minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar made this clear to Daily Maverick in New Delhi on Wednesday after some uncertainty about his government’s position on accepting new members.

The question of expanding the club of emerging nations will be a major topic at its 15th summit, in Sandton next week.

It now comprises Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. But at its summit last year, it agreed in principle to expand membership. In the run-up to next week’s summit, the bloc’s officials and ministers have been thrashing out the criteria and procedures for admitting new members. 

South African Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Naledi Pandor said last week that 23 nations had formally applied to join and several others had indicated an interest in doing so.

At a meeting of BRICS foreign ministers in Cape Town in June, the five countries were unable to agree on expansion. Officials privately told Daily Maverick then that China and Russia were the most enthusiastic about expansion, while India and Brazil were least in favour, with SA in between. 

The officials said India and Brazil, in particular, were concerned that expanding BRICS would dilute their influence in the bloc and might also alter its character and global stance, turning it into an alliance backing Russia and China in their growing confrontation with the West.

At that meeting, the foreign ministers instructed their officials to meet again and come back with an acceptable proposal on expansion.

They have reported back and the foreign ministers have since deliberated to try to refine a proposal to be put to the five leaders at next week’s summit. Pandor said last week the five countries then agreed in principle on the need for expansion, but that the proposal was still being fine-tuned. It is not clear if that has been done yet. 

India’s ‘open mind’

In an engagement with G20-member journalists in New Delhi on Wednesday attended by Daily Maverick, India’s Jaishankar suggested his country was not opposed to BRICS expansion. But he was insistent that criteria for accepting applicants must be clearly defined.

“We have an open mind on it, we have a positive view on it, but we obviously believe there have to be some criteria, some standards,” Jaishankar told Daily Maverick.

“We will need some yardstick by which we judge applicants,” the minister said, confirming that there was a “fairly large number of countries” that had expressed interest in BRICS membership.

The five BRICS governments have, however, not publicly revealed the criteria for accepting new members, leaving it unclear which, if any, of the 23 countries that have so far formally applied would be admitted and when.

Pandor named the 23 countries as Algeria, Argentina, Bangladesh, Bahrain, Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, Egypt, Ethiopia, Honduras, Indonesia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Morocco, Nigeria, State of Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, Venezuela and Vietnam.

“We see this interest as recognition of the voice of BRICS as a champion of the interests of the Global South, particularly our agenda of reform and inclusion of the Global South — true to our founding values,” she said. DM