Mariann Őry
21/06/2023 07:00
- How do the Ukraine war and the subsequent sanctions change the dynamics of international cooperations?
- Both the conflict and sanctions complicate the dynamics of international cooperation. Conflict has inspired countries such as Finland and Sweden to scamper to join NATO, not in the best interests of these countries or of NATO, definitely anathema to the interests of the Russian Federation as perceived by Russian leadership.
- Which countries can emerge as the winners of this situation? India, for example, increased its crude oil import from Russia, while Europe is importing more fuel from India than before.
- European sale of petroleum from India functions simply as a "cutout" to disguise the origin of the energy form the Russian Federation in a transparent effort to avoid sanctions. Similar to Poland's purchases of pork from China during times of martial law to prepare to feed the Soviet military in the event it occupied Poland, which it never did directly and which Deng Xiaoping stopped in its tracks once he learned of the purpose of supplying pork to a pork producing nation when Chinese were starving!
- According to recent reports, 19 countries expressed an interest in joining the BRICS ahead of its annual summit. What conclusions can we draw from this development?
- Enthusiasm for joining BRICS is interesting, most are not European except Belarus already aligned with Russia. Brazil and Argentina are contentious similar to India and Pakistan, so one wonders how delighted Brazil is with Argentina joining, India is with Pakistan joining. From this development we can suspect China is less happy than Russia because it flies in the face of China's "Belt and Road" initiative, benefitting Russian Federation more than China's objectives.
- How do all these recent changes impact China's role in world economy?
- In my judgment if so many countries join BRICS, actually this sets back China's aim to become more dominant in trade and influence, simply because with a larger BRICS Bloc China becomes one of many members, not necessarily the leading nation.