India welcomes world leaders for BRICS summit

NEW DELHI: Leaders from Russia and Iran were in India for talks on Friday, ahead of a BRICS summit dominated by conflict and economic challenges, which Chinese President Xi Jinping will also attend. Wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, as well as global trade turbulence and oil are expected on the agenda at the two-day annual summit that opened on Saturday. It will be Xi's first visit to India since 2019 and marks the biggest step yet in a cautious thaw between the rival neighbours, six years after a deadly military clash along their disputed Tibetan border.
Ties between the nuclear-armed Asian giants have been warming again, with flights, visas and high-level contacts gradually being restored. 'China stands ready to work with India... by strengthening communication, enhancing cooperation and properly handling differences', Beijing's foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said on Friday.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and visiting Russian President Vladimir Putin embraced on Friday before talks on trade, energy and defence, a day ahead of the 11-member BRICS summit. Moscow is one of New Delhi's most important strategic partners and military suppliers, with the two leaders shown by Indian broadcasters grinning and patting each other on the back at the New Delhi conference centre where Saturday's summit will be held. India has navigated the energy crisis caused by the US-Iran war in part by turning to Russia, despite Moscow's war in Ukraine and pressure from Washington and other Western capitals.
Putin last visited India in December 2025, but the two leaders met earlier this month at a Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Kyrgyzstan. Modi, speaking in Bishkek, had urged Putin to move from an 'endless war towards the end of war'. Indian refiners nearly doubled crude imports from Russia in March, in the weeks after the Middle East war erupted, helped by temporary US waivers.
Shipments then rose sharply to 2.71 million barrels per day in June and a record 2.81 million in July, according to trade intelligence firm Kpler. Imports fell to 2.07 million barrels per day in August, but remained significant, Kpler data showed. Bilateral goods trade reached $59.9 billion in 2025-26, with India exporting $4.49 billion and importing $55.37 billion, according to Indian government data.
As well as Iran, BRICS includes Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates — countries with sharply differing positions on the war launched by the United States and Israel in February. All three have been admitted to the group in recent years, joining founding member states that include India, China and Russia. 'The Gulf conflict is going to be the central fault line this time during the BRICS summit', said Harsh V Pant of India's Observer Research Foundation. 'What was seen until last year as an achievement — the expansion of BRICS — today looks like a big constraint on BRICS', Pant said.
Pezeshkian's participation — his first visit to India as Iranian president — will put the Middle East conflict firmly on the agenda. 'The war in Iran will provide a stern test of the group's cohesion', said Shilan Shah of Capital Economics, noting the failure of the BRICS foreign ministers to agree on a joint statement when they met in New Delhi in May.
India maintains cordial relations with Iran and Israel, but is also careful to strike a delicate balance in its ties with Washington. New Delhi has navigated the energy crisis sparked by the US-Iran war in part by turning to Russia for fuel despite Western sanctions as the war against Ukraine drags on. Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar visited Kyiv this month, when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he was 'grateful to India for its commitment to ending this unjust war'. — AFP