AS MZANSI hosts the upcoming BRICS summit later this month, the question on many lips is: will South Africa arrest Russian president, Vladimir Putin?
Although it has been announced that Putin won’t be attending the 15th summit, amid speculation that he could be detained under an international criminal court warrant for his arrest for war crimes in Ukraine remains to be seen.
The summit is expected to take place from 22-24 August at the Sandton Convention Centre in Joburg. COSATU, Mzansi’s biggest trade union federation, and ANC alliance partner, is hopeful the summit will be a success.
BRICS is an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. COSATU also confirmed that the Russian Federation delegation on-site will be led by its foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov.
“We support President Cyril Ramaphosa’s efforts to enhance South Africa’s hard-won non-aligned status and our firm tradition of negotiations to resolve often intractable conflicts at home and abroad,”
Matthew Parks, acting national spokesperson and parliamentary coordinator, said.
COSATU added that BRICS is a growing and influential group of nations bringing together over 32 billion people.
Parks continued, “BRICS is important for South Africa as its members are among our major trading partners and sources of investment and tourism.”
The BRICS Bank has begun to play a positive role in investing in South Africa’s infrastructure needs. The promotion of trade, investment, and financing is key to growing Mzansi’s economy, addressing our infrastructure backlog, and slashing unemployment and poverty,” concluded Parks.