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Iran war: Why the BRICS foreign ministers meeting in India matters

Iran war: Why the BRICS foreign ministers meeting in India matters

India is hosting a meeting of foreign ministers from BRICS nations on May 14-15 in a precursor to the 18th BRICS summit, which New Delhi will host in September. The meeting, which starts on Thursday morning, coincides with United States President Donald Trump’s three-day visit to Beijing for a state visit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping. Here is more about the foreign ministers’ meeting, who is attending and why it matters. What is BRICS? BRICS is a grouping of major emerging economies seeking to coordinate security and economic policy in order to amplify the demands of the Global South at international organisations and on issues where the West has traditionally dominated economically and politically. The acronym stands for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. The organisation was called BRIC in its initial form – Brazil, Russia, India and China – when its foreign ministers began meeting in 2006, and when it held its first summit in 2009. It became BRICS when South Africa joined in 2010. In 2023, BRICS extended invitations to Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates after these countries applied for membership. Saudi Arabia has yet to formally join, but the others have. An invitation was also extended to Argentina, but was turned down as President Javier Milei, elected in December 2023, had campaigned on the promise of bolstering ties with the West. Indonesia joined the group in January 2025, after its membership was approved during the summit in 2023 in Johannesburg. Advertisement The group sets priorities and holds discussions at an annual summit, which members take turns hosting. Last year, Brazil hosted the BRICS meeting and, in 2024, Russia hosted the annual meeting. This year, it is India’s turn to host. This week’s meeting in New Delhi will bring together the foreign ministers of BRICS countries, who are expected to discuss economic cooperation and coordinate their positions on key global issues. When and where is the BRICS foreign ministers’ meeting? The BRICS foreign ministers’ meeting, held to prepare for the 18th BRICS summit in September, will take place on Thursday, May 14, and Friday, May 15, in New Delhi, India’s Ministry of External Affairs said on Tuesday. On Thursday, foreign ministers are expected to arrive at 10:00am (04:30 GMT), and sessions are expected to take place throughout the day, concluding with a dinner at 7pm (01:30 GMT). On Friday, one session is expected to take place, starting at 10:00am (04:30 GMT). All of the meetings except one will take place in Bharat Mandapam, an exhibition hall and convention centre located close to the Supreme Court of India. On Thursday at 1pm (07:30 GMT), Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will join a joint conference call with the visiting leaders from Seva Teerth, a new administrative complex that serves as the official headquarters of the prime minister’s office. Who is attending the meeting? Foreign ministers from within and outside the BRICS group are expected to attend the meeting. The Russian Foreign Ministry has said that Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will attend the meeting. South Africa’s Ronald Lamola and Brazil’s Mauro Vieira are also both attending. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi will not attend due to Trump’s visit to Beijing. Instead, China will be represented by China’s Ambassador to India Xu Feihong, Indian media has reported. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has landed in New Delhi to participate. Indonesia’s Foreign Minister Sugiono also arrived in New Delhi on Wednesday. It is not clear who will be representing the UAE at the BRICS meeting, even as the US-Israel war on Iran exacerbates tensions between the UAE and Iran. Russia’s President Vladimir Putin attends an online meeting with South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa and other leaders of BRICS nations, in Sochi, Russia, on September 8, 2025 [File: Sputnik/Vyacheslav Prokofyev/Pool via Reuters] What’s on the agenda? The theme of this meeting is “Building for Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability”, according to India’s Foreign Ministry. This will focus on “people-centric and holistic healthcare, with an emphasis on collaboration on pressing health challenges, including communicable and non-communicable diseases”, it added. Advertisement However, the ongoing war on Iran is likely to dominate, and discussions will set the agenda for the annual BRICS summit in September, observers say. “The Iran war is likely to cast a shadow over both the BRICS summit and the Trump-Xi meeting,” Rafael Loss, a policy fellow for defence, security and technology at the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), told Al Jazeera. The war on Iran entered its 76th day on Thursday, with diplomatic efforts to end the conflict hanging in the balance. Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported that, as well as taking part in the main BRICS sessions, Araghchi will hold separate meetings with Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and other officials attending the meeting. In April this year, India hosted a BRICS Deputy Foreign Ministers and Special Envoys for the Middle East and North Africa meeting in New Delhi. That gathering ended without a joint statement after Iran and the UAE clashed over how to address the US-Israeli war on Iran, with the UAE also seeing itself as a victim of Iranian aggression. Since then, tensions between Iran and the UAE have only risen, with Tehran’s war messaging increasingly targeting the UAE. Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza is also another point of stress within the bloc. At the April meeting, India – recently an Israeli ally – attempted to soften criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza, leading to a failure within the bloc to arrive at a consensus on the subject. “The meeting in India occurs at a difficult time in which the cohesion of the BRICS confronts challenges due to the closer relations of India with the US and Israel, and the conflict in West Asia between Iran and the UAE,” Michael Dunford, emeritus professor at the School of Global Studies at the University of Sussex, UK, told Al Jazeera. What about Trump’s meeting with Xi at the same time? Trump landed in China on Wednesday evening

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