BRICS leaders addressed the BRICS Business Forum at its conclusion today, as is customary, and Russian President Vladimir Putin among them, albeit by video. While Putin was prevented by a blatantly fraudulent International Criminal Court arrest warrant from attending the BRICS summit in Johannesburg in person, his remarks delivered by livestream zeroed in on critical points that can be taken up by the BRICS leaders’ summit.
Putin said: “It is important that this Forum focuses on such pressing issues as the post-pandemic economic recovery of the BRICS states, improvement of citizens’ well-being, industrial modernization, development of effective transport and logistics chains, and stimulation of equitable technology transfers.
“These challenging and complex tasks need to be tackled against the backdrop of the increasing volatility in stock, currency, energy and food markets, coupled with substantial inflationary pressure stemming from, inter alia, the irresponsible large-scale money creation by a number of countries seeking to mitigate the effects of the pandemic, which has led to the accumulation of private and public debt.
“The global economic situation is also seriously affected by the illegitimate sanctions practice and illegal freezing of assets of sovereign states, which essentially amounts to trampling upon all the basic norms and rules of free trade and economic life—norms and rules that not so long ago seemed immutable.”
He went on: “Prices for food, basic agricultural products and crops are forced up, making the most vulnerable, poor countries suffer the most.
“Importantly, under these circumstances the BRICS states have stepped up their interaction.… More and more new infrastructure and investment projects are being launched, mutual trade is growing, industry contacts are expanding.
