In the coming days, Russian President Vladimir Putin will welcome several world leaders, including China's Xi Jinping, India's Narendra Modi, Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Iran's Massoud Pezeshkian.
They will gather today in the Russian city of Kazan for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing countries, defying predictions that the war in Ukraine and an international arrest warrant will ostracize Putin on the international stage.
The alliance, which aims to oppose the Western-led world order, initially included Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, but this year began to expand rapidly, the Associated Press agency points out. Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia joined in January; Turkey, Azerbaijan and Malaysia have formally applied for membership, and several other countries have expressed interest in becoming members.
Russian officials see it as a huge success. Putin's foreign policy adviser, Yuri Ushakov, said 32 countries have confirmed participation, and more than 20 will send heads of state.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić was also invited to the summit. At the beginning of September, at a meeting with the Deputy Prime Minister of the Government of Serbia, Aleksandar Vulin, Putin said that he was expecting Vučić in Kazan. However, the Serbian president did not publicly announce his decision regarding participation in the summit until last night, and the Russian media announced, as reported by N1, that Serbia will be represented in Kazan by Vulin.
Visual effect and deals
Putin will hold about 20 bilateral meetings, Ushakov said, and the summit could become "the biggest foreign policy event ever held" on Russian soil.
Analysts say the Kremlin wants to achieve both the visual effect of Putin standing shoulder to shoulder with his global allies amid ongoing tensions with the West, as well as the practicality of possible deals with them to bolster Russia's economy and war effort. For other participants, this is an opportunity to express their views and narrative more loudly.
"The beauty of BRICS is that it does not impose too many obligations on you," said Aleksandar Gabujev, director of the Carnegie Center for Russia and Eurasia. "There really aren't many conditions for BRICS membership. At the same time, interesting opportunities may arise, including more direct meetings with all these leaders”. For Putin, the summit is of personal importance because it shows the failure of Western attempts to isolate him, Gabuyev added to AP.
The Kremlin will have the opportunity to talk to major players like India and China about expanding trade and circumventing Western sanctions. India is an important market for Russian raw materials, while Moscow hopes to acquire dual-purpose goods in China, Gabuyev said.
Russia also wants more countries to participate in a payment system project that would be an alternative to the global banking messaging network SWIFT, allowing Moscow to trade with its partners without worrying about sanctions.
"The Russian idea is that if you create a platform where China, Russia, India, Brazil and Saudi Arabia are, the US will not be ready to hang on to that platform and impose sanctions on it," Gabuyev said.
Jaroslav Lisovolik, founder of BRICS+ Analytics, told Reuters that creating such a system is technically feasible, but it will take time. "After the significant expansion of BRICS membership last year, reaching a consensus is probably more difficult," he said.
In a document prepared by the Russian Ministry of Finance and the Central Bank, which was distributed to journalists ahead of the summit, existing international financial institutions, such as the IMF, are accused of serving the interests of Western countries.
Expectations from Iran and China
Russia is expected to sign a "comprehensive strategic partnership" agreement with Iran, strengthening the ever-closer ties between Moscow and Tehran. After the invasion of Ukraine, Iran supplied Moscow with hundreds of drones and helped start their production in Russia. Iran, in turn, wants sophisticated Russian weapons, such as long-range air defense systems and fighter jets, to defend against a possible Israeli attack.
For China, BRICS is one of several international organizations - along with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, focused on security - through which it tries to promote an alternative to the US-led world order, AP points out.
The summit will allow Xi and Putin to highlight their close cooperation. The two leaders have already met twice this year, in Beijing in May and at the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in Kazakhstan in July.
Although they will continue to present a united front, experts are watching for subtle signs of Xi's estrangement from Putin over the war.
"While Putin will want China-Russia relations to look better than ever, Xi could also signal to Western countries and others that Beijing officially remains neutral in Russia's war in Ukraine and is not a formal ally of Moscow," said Eva Seivert, an expert on in foreign policy and security from the Mercatore Institute for Chinese Studies in Berlin. "It will be crucial to present China as a serious and legitimate mediator in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine."
Balancing with India and Turkey
The expected meeting between Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Putin could bring some rebalancing of their relations. Western friends want India to be more active in persuading Moscow to end the war. Modi avoided condemning Russia while stressing the need for a peaceful solution.
This is the second meeting between the two leaders in the last few months. Modi visited Russia in July, also met with Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky in August, and in September traveled to the US where he met with Joe Biden.
"India cannot simply abandon Russia because of deep defense ties, regional balance of power issues and the logic of multilateral alignment," said Raja Mohan, a professor at the Institute of South Asian Studies in Singapore. "At the same time, it is also building and developing its relations with the US and the West, because the logic of India's economic development and technological growth relies on partnership."
India and Brazil view BRICS primarily through an economic lens to promote a fairer distribution of power in the international system, while "China and Russia see it more as a geopolitical forum," said Chijetigi Bajpai, who studies South Asia at Chatham House in London.
India and Brazil also do not want to be "drawn into China's gravitational orbit," said Teresa Fallon of the Center for Russian, European and Asian Studies.
Another key participant is Turkey, which has applied to join BRICS. This is happening at a time when this NATO member and candidate for EU membership is increasingly dissatisfied with the actions of the West.
Turkey's EU membership talks have been stagnant since 2016 due to disputes with Cyprus and human rights concerns. Turkey's relations with Washington have been strained after Turkey was excluded from the F-35 fighter jet program due to the purchase of a Russian air defense system. Erdogan also accuses the US and other Western allies of alleged "complicity" in Israel's military actions in Gaza.
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