BRICS Conference in Visakhapatnam Addressed Issues of Chemical Weapons

At the BRICS summit held in Visakhapatnam recently, West Asia was a topic of conversation along with the conflicts at Syria, Libya, Iraq, Yemen and Palestine. But what caught the most attention was the BRICS countries urging the global community to address issues of chemical weapons by presenting a united front.

A communique posted on the website of the Russian Foreign Ministry states, “While strongly condemning the use of chemical weapons by anyone under any circumstances, they called upon the international community to remain united while addressing any use or threat of use of chemical weapons and stressed the importance of continued cooperation between OPCW Technical Secretariat, OPCW-UN Joint Investigative Mechanism with the Syrian authorities.”

Joint Secretary (West Asia and North Africa) B Bala Bhaskar told The Hindu that terrorism, terror funding, use of latest technological networks and the current situations are what were discussed at the Visakhapatnam meet. The situation all over the world is fast deteriorating with no clarity on who’s bombing whom in response to terror attacks. The need to evolve a common strategy and safeguard interests in such conflicting situations was the need of the hour at the BRICS Summit.

“We are dependent on the West Asia for import of 80% of our crude. Our humanitarian effort in rescuing seven million people stranded in the civil war areas in Iraq, Yemen, North Africa, and Libya is well acclaimed,” Bhaskar said. India sent in medicines worth $1 million to Somalia and South Sudan and extended aid worth $50 million to Palestine. A joint initiative has already been put in place by the BRICS member countries to counter terrorism.