Tuesday, May 06, 2008
UPDATE: BRIC Ministers to Meet
Earlier today, I passed along a news tidbit from The Hindu about the Indian-Brazilian-South African joint naval exercises.
Now, The Hindu is reporting:
"The Foreign Ministers of Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC) will meet exclusively for the first time in the Russian city of Ekaterinburg on May 14 with economics and cooperation at multilateral fora topping the agenda.
"A meeting of Foreign Ministers of Russia, India, China (RIC) will take place at the same venue the next day as a follow-up to their regular interactions, the latest being in Harbin, China, last year. Although the BRIC Foreign Ministers have discussed the prospects of mutual cooperation on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, the agenda here will be solely focused on promoting the concept of BRIC."
Folks, we live in a dynamic world where powers keep open their options and hedge their bets. India does joint military exercises with the United States, reaches out to other middle powers to do their "own thing" and schedules regular consultations with the foreign ministers of China and Russia. India disproves the thesis about countries choosing and sticking with "blocs" and instead seems to indicate countries feel safer with multipolar options.
So two southern democracies, one sovereign democracy/managed pluralist state and one state still under the guiding role of the Communist Party are seeing whether they have common ground for policies.
Read the full Hindu piece, it is quite interesting.
Now, The Hindu is reporting:
"The Foreign Ministers of Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC) will meet exclusively for the first time in the Russian city of Ekaterinburg on May 14 with economics and cooperation at multilateral fora topping the agenda.
"A meeting of Foreign Ministers of Russia, India, China (RIC) will take place at the same venue the next day as a follow-up to their regular interactions, the latest being in Harbin, China, last year. Although the BRIC Foreign Ministers have discussed the prospects of mutual cooperation on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, the agenda here will be solely focused on promoting the concept of BRIC."
Folks, we live in a dynamic world where powers keep open their options and hedge their bets. India does joint military exercises with the United States, reaches out to other middle powers to do their "own thing" and schedules regular consultations with the foreign ministers of China and Russia. India disproves the thesis about countries choosing and sticking with "blocs" and instead seems to indicate countries feel safer with multipolar options.
So two southern democracies, one sovereign democracy/managed pluralist state and one state still under the guiding role of the Communist Party are seeing whether they have common ground for policies.
Read the full Hindu piece, it is quite interesting.
