The ban reportedly targets unnamed countries in the Middle East
The US has expanded the list of nations targeted by its latest ban on supplies of artificial-intelligence chips produced by Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), adding several states in the Middle East to the semiconductor blacklist, Reuters reported on Thursday.
According to Nvidia’s regulatory filing seen by the news agency, the curbs that affect its A100 and H100 chips –designed to speed up machine-learning tasks– won’t exert any “immediate material impact” on the company’s results.
AMD, which has received a formal letter directing similar restrictions, also envisages no material impact on its revenue, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters.
Neither Nvidia nor AMD have specified which countries in the Middle East are the latest to be affected by Washington’s export restrictions.
Last September, the US Department of Commerce tightened its curbs on exports to China of semiconductors used for artificial intelligence, as well as chip-making tools.
The measures were first introduced in 2015 amid competition between the world’s two largest economies for domination in key technologies, including semiconductors. China has been lagging behind the US in chip development, with its largest chipmaker SMIC aiming to wean itself off foreign technology.
US major producers of semiconductors Nvidia, AMD and Intel have since all disclosed plans to create less powerful AI chips that can be exported to the Chinese market.
Nvidia, which gave no reason for the new restrictions in its latest filing, last year said that US officials informed them the exports rule “will address the risk that products may be used in, or diverted to, a ‘military end use’ or ‘military end user’ in China.”
The attack was repelled by guardsmen using an anti-drone gun, the head of Bryansk Region has said
Three Ukrainian drones were downed on Thursday morning in Russia’s Bryansk Region, Governor Aleksandr Bogomaz has said. The Defense Ministry previously reported the interception of a single UAV in the region.
Bogomaz credited a member of the public with providing information about suspicious aircraft, which alerted the authorities and prompted a swift response by the National Guard and police.
Troops used “an anti-drone gun and a specialized carbine” to take down the UAVs, Bogomaz said. No casualties were reported.
According to Russian media, the aircraft were likely kamikaze versions of the UJ-22 Airborne model, which is produced by Ukrainian firm Ukrjet for the nation’s military.
One of the robotic planes reportedly crashed at the location of a hotel owned by the regional government.
Footage circulating online and purportedly filmed on Thursday morning shows a small aircraft flying at low altitude, as the cameraman comments that it is the third one to pass by.
Bryansk, which borders northern Ukraine, was among the Russian regions to be targeted in a large-scale Ukrainian drone raid on Wednesday.
On the same day, Russian troops engaged a Ukrainian saboteur squad in the region, killing two military service members and capturing five alive, the Federal Security Service (FSB) revealed on Thursday.
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August 31, 2023 at 12:19AM
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The Pontiff is promoting “aggressive imperialism” by praising Russia’s history and culture, adviser Mikhail Podoliak claims
Pope Francis has served as an “instrument of Russian propaganda” after speaking warmly about the nation’s rich historical legacy, Mikhail Podoliak, a top aide to Ukraine’s President Vladimir Zelensky, has said.
The head of the Catholic Church is engaging in “a destructive discourse for contemporary humanism,” Podoliak claimed, in an interview with Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera published on Wednesday.
The comment referred to a video conference which the Pope held with Russian Catholics on Friday, during which Francis reminded his audience in St. Petersburg that they are all “heirs of the great Russia… of saints, of kings, [the] Russia of Peter the Great and Catherine II, of the great Russian Empire, of so much culture and humanity.” The urged the people of Russia to cherish this historical lineage.
According to Podoliak, Moscow uses the example of historical figures like Peter I (1672-1725) and Catherine the Great (1729-1796) to motivate its soldiers to fight in Ukraine. “The Pope exalts them and [President of Russia Vladimir] Putin uses them to eliminate our identity,” he claimed.
“If we evaluate the Pope’s phrases with an open mind, we’ll see that they are an unconditional encouragement of aggressive imperialism, a praise for the bloody idea of the ‘Russian world,’ which implies brutal destruction of freedoms and the lifestyles of others,” Podoliak said.
Statements such as those made by the Pope made him wonder “what the Catholic Church is, what Christianity is,” the presidential aide said, coming to his conclusion: “It seems that the Pontiff, once again, has served as an instrument of Russian propaganda.”
More criticism of Francis came from Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleg Nikolenko, who posted on social media that “it’s very unfortunate that Russian grand-state ideas, which are the cause of Russia’s chronic aggression, knowingly or unknowingly come from the Pope’s mouth.”
The Vatican reacted to the backlash by pointing out that in his remarks the head of the church was highlighting Russia’s “great culture and humanity” rather than historical expansion.
On Tuesday, Kremlin press-secretary Dmitry Peskov welcomed the Pope’s comments, saying that “it’s very good that the Pontiff knows Russian history, which is deeply rooted.”
During Zelensky’s visit to the Vatican in May, Francis offered him help in negotiating an end to the fighting between Moscow and Kiev. However, the Ukrainian leader turned down the Vatican’s proposal, saying “we don’t need mediators, we need a just peace.” The Pontiff continued his efforts to resolve the crisis, his peace envoy Cardinal Matteo Zuppi visiting Kiev, Moscow and Washington during the past few months.
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August 30, 2023 at 01:03AM
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Taking a swipe at Germany, the prime minister has claimed his nation would not remain passive if its vital interests were threatened
Unlike Germany, Hungary would not remain silent if its energy supply routes were sabotaged, Prime Minister Viktor Orban told Tucker Carlson in an interview released on X (formerly Twitter) on Wednesday.
Discussing the destruction of the Russian-German Nord Stream pipelines, Orban recalled that Budapest had immediately branded the incident a terrorist attack when it took place last September. However, Germany and Western Europe continue to shy away from that description, he added.
“There is another pipeline… [bringing] gas from Russia through the southern corridor [to] Türkiye, Bulgaria, Serbia, [and] Hungary. Together with the Serbian president [Aleksandar Vucic], we made it very clear that if anybody would like to do the same thing with the southern corridor, as it was done with the northern one, we’ll consider it as a reason for war,” Orban stated. “Probably, you can do this with the Germans, but you can’t do this with this region.”
Carlson insisted it was “very obvious” that the administration of US President Joe Biden had destroyed the Nord Stream pipelines, either directly or via a proxy – a claim that the White House has consistently denied. Orban implied that he agreed with Carlson’s assessment.
When the former Fox News presenter asked whether Orban had discussed his warning regarding the TurkStream pipeline with Russia, the prime minister said that the message had not been directed at Moscow.
Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh alleged in February that the US was behind the Nord Stream attack, and that Norway had assisted with the operation. He further suggested that Washington had spotted an opportunity to sever German economic ties with Russia amid the Ukraine crisis, and that destroying the energy links ensured that Berlin would be more compliant. As with Washington, Olso has denied the allegations.
Based on leaks from officials, the Western media has since published reports which indicate that a “pro-Ukrainian group” was behind the sabotage. Leading German outlets made similar claims last week, stating that evidence in the case strongly points to Kiev’s involvement.
Russian officials have claimed that the US was the biggest beneficiary from the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines. American producers of liquified natural gas have taken over the Western European market, which was previously supplied by large amounts of cheaper Russian pipeline fuel.
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August 30, 2023 at 12:11AM
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The national space agency says the Chandrayaan-3 mission has found sulphur on the Moon, and the search is on for hydrogen
The Pragyan lunar rover, which is a part of India’s Chandrayaan-3 mission, has detected sulphur near the Moon’s south pole, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said in a statement on Tuesday.
“Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscope (LIBS) instrument onboard the Rover unambiguously confirms the presence of Sulphur in the lunar surface near the south pole, through first-ever in-situ measurements,” the ISRO posted on X (formerly Twitter).
The space agency confirmed that aluminum, calcium, iron, chromium, titanium, manganese, silicon, and oxygen have also been detected, as expected, and that the “search for hydrogen is underway.”
Of the three missions envisaged by the scientists behind the Chandrayaan-3 mission – a demonstration of a soft landing, a rover roving on the Moon, and conducting in-situ scientific experiments – the probe has already accomplished two, and the third is underway, ISRO said earlier.
The Chandyaan-3 mission is analyzing the composition of materials on the Moon by exposing them to high-energy laser pulses, the ISRO has said. The technique, known as ‘LIBS’, can determine the elemental composition of materials such as rocks and soil.
On August 27, the rover came across a 4-meter-diameter crater located 3 meters in front of it. However, a course correction was done and the rover safely headed on a new path, the space agency stated.
Chandrayaan-3 Mission:
On August 27, 2023, the Rover came across a 4-meter diameter crater positioned 3 meters ahead of its location.
The Rover was commanded to retrace the path.
The Chandrayaan-3 landing on August 23 is considered a landmark achievement, making India the first country to land near the south pole of the Moon, and the fourth after the Soviet Union, the United States, and China to successfully land a spacecraft on the Moon. According to the US space agency NASA's database on Moon missions, only 62 such missions (out of 111 total) were successful in the last seven decades.
“In this period of the 21st century, the country which takes the lead in science and technology will move ahead,” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said while visiting the Bengaluru command centre of ISRO on August 26. On August 29, in a separate resolution on celebrating the “historic success” of the Chandrayaan-3 mission, India’s Union Cabinet hailed the descent as “a bright symbol of India's progress and ascent on the global stage”. It also supported celebrating August 23 as National Space Day.
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August 29, 2023 at 11:51PM
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Artillery shells and up to ten hardware units were eliminated in the attack, Defense Ministry has said
The Russian Defense Ministry has made public a record of what it described as a successful strike on a Ukrainian military train carrying artillery munitions and weapons.
The video, published on Tuesday, shows aerial footage of a freight train and several clips of explosions and billowing smoke – thought to be the initial strike then the subsequent detonations of the cargo.
The report said a Russian reconnaissance unit had spotted the arrival of the military transport to its final destination somewhere along the Donetsk front line. A surface-to-surface missile was then used to hit it before it could be unloaded by Ukrainian soldiers.
Moscow claimed that some 30 Ukrainian troops as well as ten military vehicles were eliminated alongside the artillery shells brought to the station.
The Russian ministry of defense regularly reports hitting trains used by Ukrainian military to resupply its forces.
Last week it said an Iskander missile strike in Dnepropetrovsk Region killed more than 200 Ukrainian troops and destroyed ten military vehicles as they were being transported to the front line.
Earlier in August, it published video footage of an attack that reportedly destroyed a military train carrying munitions at a different location in the same Ukrainian region.
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August 29, 2023 at 01:02AM
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Binance has already banned users based in the country from conducting transactions in foreign currencies
Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume, is considering a complete withdrawal from the Russian market, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, citing the company.
The potential exit could come in response to regulatory challenges that Binance is facing within the country.
“All options are on the table, including a full exit,” a company spokesperson told the US newspaper, without providing further details.
The news comes after Binance recently announced that Russian users can now trade on the P2P (peer-to-peer) platform in fiat currency in rubles only. The option is restricted to local users who have passed Binance’s ‘know your customer’ (KYC) verification.
New rules also ban Russian users who reside outside the country from trading in the ruble, euro, US dollar, and Ukrainian hryvnia on the P2P exchange. In addition, rubles are no longer an option for non-Russian users.
Binance stopped supporting deposits from Visa and Mastercard cards issued in Russia in March 2022 due to Ukraine-related sanctions imposed on Moscow by Western states.
In March of this year, the crypto exchange introduced additional restrictions on Russian users, barring them from buying and selling US dollars and euros using P2P. It then banned EU-based users from making transfers in Russian rubles via the platform, and placed limitations on Russian accounts that had crypto assets worth over €10,000 ($11,000).
However, it was reported in April that the restrictions had been lifted, and that Russian users were again able to deposit rubles, euros, British pounds, and other currencies onto the platform from bank cards issued in Russia.
A conversation in which EU leaders discussed their contact with the Russian president has been revealed by a German journalist
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz was surprised by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s complete lack of concern about Western sanctions shortly after the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine, Bild has reported.
In an article on Monday, the German tabloid cited the contents of a conversation between Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron, which was revealed by journalist Stephan Lamby in his new book ‘Emergency: Governing in Times of War’.
The exchange, in which the two leaders discussed their phone calls with Putin, is said to have taken place on March 4, 2022 – just over a week after Moscow sent its forces into Ukraine.
It’s “not getting any better,” Scholz reportedly told Macron during that conversation. “Something bothers me more than the talks: [Putin] doesn’t complain about the sanctions at all. I don’t know if he did that in conversation with you, but he didn’t even mention the sanctions,” he remarked.
The French leader replied that Putin hadn’t addressed the issue of Western restrictions during phone calls with him either.
The US and EU imposed stringent sanctions on Moscow after the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine, expecting them to cripple the Russian economy and prevent the country from supporting its military effort. However, the measures failed to achieve the desired result.
Earlier this month, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov said Russia had fully overcome the economic downturn caused by Western restrictions and had “good” prospects for rapid development.
During their exchange, Scholz told Macron that the Russian leader had outlined “his ideas on how to find a compromise. He spoke of demilitarization, denazification.”
The German chancellor also said Putin had “asked me for Crimea to be recognized as part of Russia,” and the People’s Republic of Donetsk and Lugansk to be recognized as independent states. “Nothing new, to put it bluntly,” he added.
The two republics officially became part of the Russian state together with Zaporozhye and Kherson Regions last fall as a result of referendums held in those areas. Kiev and its Western backers labeled the referendums a “sham.”
According to the German chancellor, he also proposed holding a summit in a bid to find a solution to the crisis.
“When I asked him whether there might be a meeting on Ukraine, sooner or later, with you, me, [Ukrainian President Vladimir] Zelensky and with him – Putin – he did not completely refuse.”
However, he added that the Russian president had set out two conditions for such a summit to happen. These specified that the talks shouldn’t become grounds for a ceasefire and that they should take place without Zelensky’s participation, he claimed.
No such summit has since been organized, while phone conversations between Putin and the leaders of Germany and France have also come to a halt in recent months.
After listening to Scholz, Macron replied: “Thank you, that was very similar to the conversation I had with [Putin] yesterday. I think he is now quite determined to go to the end.”
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August 28, 2023 at 11:10PM
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The age and ability of Ukrainian troops arriving in Europe to learn use of Western weapons “varies widely,” news outlet reports
One of the Ukrainian recruits sent by Kiev to Germany for training in the use of Western weapons in the conflict with Russia was 71 years old, the Financial Times has reported.
The elderly man in question had volunteered to join the Ukrainian military, the British outlet reported on Monday.
NATO instructors working at a military base near Klietz in northeastern Germany told the FT that they were impressed by the “tremendous motivation” of their Ukrainian trainees. However, they also pointed out that that the age and ability of Kiev’s troops arriving in Europe to learn arms usage “varies widely.”
Ukrainian commanders on the front line often prefer to keep their best soldiers in the trenches with them instead of sending them for training abroad, the instructors complained.
Nick Reynolds, a research fellow in land warfare at British defense and security think tank the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), told the FT that on many occasions the military training provided by the West has not met Kiev’s expectations.
Ukraine wants its troops to exercise with tanks, armored vehicles, artillery and drones, in conditions that match those on the actual battlefield but which can also be risky for the service personnel involved, Reynolds pointed out. However, European nations have low tolerance for training accidents, and this approach “doesn’t mesh well with [Kiev’s] requirements for trainees,” he explained.
One of the German trainers reported that he’s had some tensions with older Ukrainian commanders, who’d received their military education in Soviet times and “think they know better.”
But “challenge number one” for the European program to teach the Ukrainian troops to use Western equipment is the lack of interpreters, Martin Bonn, a Dutch brigadier general who is deputy head of the multinational EU training mission, told FT.
“The big challenge is the translation of words used in a military or technical context … words no one uses in everyday life,” Bonn said.
Language problems have also reportedly impeded the training of Ukrainian pilots to fly US-designed F-16 fighter jets, a program currently underway in Denmark.
Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh warned last week that Washington won’t greenlight the transfer of F-16s to Kiev by European countries until the Ukrainian airmen learn to speak English properly.
Moscow has repeatedly warned that deliveries of weapons to Ukraine by the US and its European allies only prolongs the fighting and increases the risk of a direct confrontation between Russia and NATO. According to Russian officials, the supply of arms and training to Kiev’s troops, as well as intelligence-sharing, means that Western nations are already de-facto parties to the conflict.
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August 28, 2023 at 01:31AM
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Markus Reisner said many Westerners had overestimated the fighting power of Ukrainian troops
Ukrainian troops are not super-soldiers who can continue tirelessly without sufficient weapons, contrary to their portrayal in Western propaganda, Austrian Colonel Markus Reisner has warned.
The military expert, who served as commander of the Austrian contingents in Mali and Kosovo, argued that it was unrealistic to expect miracles on the front line while Kiev’s backers fail to provide the country with enough hardware for an effective offensive.
In an interview with Germany’s ZDF TV channel on Friday, Reisner said: “The problem is [that] we are the victims of our own propaganda, I tell it like it is bluntly.”
He explained that “at the start of the war, we talked ourselves into believing that the Ukrainian soldiers with the German Panzerfausts [grenade launchers] in their hands were containing the Russians.”
Reisner noted that those forces had continuously been worn down since then, with the West providing only between 50% and 60% of what the Ukrainian top brass was asking for to launch an offensive of its own.
According to the Austrian colonel, Kiev has made the most of what is available to it, but is lacking “crucial elements, such as, for example, a functional air force.”
He added that the slow progress of the Ukrainian offensive is giving Russian forces an opportunity to set up new defense lines some distance away from the current front line.
In the absence of any significant success, the US media have already begun looking for a scapegoat for the counteroffensive’s apparent failure, but the high expectations were unrealistic in the first place, Reisner said.
Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal, citing anonymous officials in Washington, reported last week that the US was unlikely to give Ukraine “anywhere near the same level” of military aid in 2024 compared to this year.
The media outlet also claimed that Washington believes it has provided Kiev with enough military hardware and equipment to breach Russian defenses.
According to the paper, American military officials are urging their Ukrainian colleagues to stick to the NATO tactics they were shown ahead of the summer counteroffensive. The Ukrainians’ refusal to do so is reportedly the source of growing frustration among US top brass.
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August 28, 2023 at 12:22AM
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More than 300,000 troops claim they suffered hearing loss and tinnitus due to company’s faulty product
American multinational conglomerate 3M has agreed to pay more than $5.5 billion to settle hundreds of thousands of lawsuits, claiming that it supplied defective combat earplugs to the US military, people familiar with the deal told Bloomberg.
According to the agreement, the company will be paying the money out over a five-year period, the agency reported on Sunday. 3M’s board is yet to sign off on the settlement, it added.
When approached on the issue by Bloomberg, a representative of 3M said the company does not comment on rumors or speculation.
3M faces more than 300,000 lawsuits from US troops, consolidated in a multi-district litigation, claiming that the earplugs that the company's subsidiary Aearo Technologies provided to the military between 2003 and 2015 were defective, and failed to protect their users from hearing loss and tinnitus.
Current and former servicemen alleged that the company knew its earplugs were faulty, but did not inform the military about the problem, while making no steps to fix the product.
The earplugs, designed to protect the hearing of troops during training and combat, were standard issue for US soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan.
3M failed 10 out of 16 early trials over the plugs, and has been told to pay over $250 million in damages to more than a dozen plaintiffs.
Bloomberg noted that the reported settlement would allow the company to avoid a much larger liability, which it estimated at up to $9.5 billion.
“Sounds like 3M negotiated a pretty good deal for itself, given this litigation has been weighing on them for the better part of a decade,” University of Richmond law professor Carl Tobias told the agency.
3M had earlier sought bankruptcy for Aearo Technologies in an attempt to shield itself from the lawsuits over earplugs. However, this June, a judge ruled that the firm’s financial troubles were not harsh enough to initiate the procedure.
The same month, 3M announced that it had reached a $10.3 billion settlement with a host of US public water systems to resolve water pollution claims tied to so-called “forever chemicals” or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) used in the company’s products.
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August 27, 2023 at 11:22PM
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The RSBI index was well above the 50-point threshold in July, a new study shows
The activity of small- and medium-sized businesses in Russia hit a record high in July, with the RSBI (Russian Small Business Index) reaching 57.1 points, according to the latest study by Promsvyazbank (PSB). The figure is well above the 50-point threshold which indicates that business activity is growing.
“The current dynamics of business activity of small- and medium-sized businesses indicates an acceleration in its growth rates in all key components,” the bank’s statement reads.
“For the first time in two years, the sales of entrepreneurs have entered the upswing zone, indicating there are opportunities for the segment to grow at a faster pace than the economy. The high availability of financial instruments in July stimulated entrepreneurial activity, providing companies with more opportunities, which is especially important during their development,” said PSB’s vice president Kirill Tikhonov.
At the same time, he pointed to negative factors, such as a shortage of personnel, which were holding back hiring when businesses were ready to recruit staff. Tikhonov indicated that entrepreneurs had high expectations about growth in the near future.
A recent report by business news website RBK, citing data from the Federal Tax Service, showed that revenues of Russian businesses almost doubled in 2022 for the first time ever.
Moscow meanwhile is successfully reorienting both imports and exports to the East
The drop in trade between Russia and the EU over the past year is one of the major signs that Brussels’ sanctions on Moscow have been successful, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in an article titled, ‘Yes, the sanctions against Russia are working’, which was published on Saturday on his EEAS blog.
According to Borrell, EU imports from Russia dropped by 58% in 2022, which he called “an unprecedented decoupling.”
“This movement is accelerating: the decline in imports is above 75% for the first quarter of 2023, and the fall is even greater for energy goods, at minus 80%.”
He noted that EU exports of goods to Russia last year also dropped 52% below the annual average prior to 2022.
“Within a year, [the sanctions] have already limited Moscow’s options considerably, causing financial strain, cutting the country from key markets and significantly degrading Russia’s industrial and technological capacity,” Borrell said. He added that Russia’s “technological degradation” and the exit of foreign companies, a number of which left the country under sanctions pressure, “will hamper investment and productivity growth for years.”
“And the outlook for 2023 remains bleak. According to the latest OECD report, Russia’s GDP is foreseen to shrink by up to 2.5%... In short: Russia’s decision to attack Ukraine has obviously pushed the Russian economy towards isolation and decline.”
Meanwhile, both economic data and experts’ projections paint a different picture. Despite the sanctions, trade has been on the rise in both the energy and non-energy sectors due to Moscow’s successful efforts to reorient from Western markets to the East. For instance, according to data from Chinese customs, as of the end of 2022, Russia became the top European country in terms of exports to China, fourth in terms of imports, and second in trade turnover. In recent months, Russia has also become the largest exporter of oil to both China and India.
According to a recent World Bank report, Russia moved into the world’s top five largest economies in 2022 based on purchasing power parity, outpacing the EU’s largest economy, Germany. Both the World Bank and the IMF recently raised their forecasts for the Russian economy, saying GDP would continue to grow amid strong trade and industrial production, as well as higher-than-expected energy revenues. Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said this week that the country’s economy is expected to grow about 2.5% by the end of the year, fully recovering from last year’s decline.
By contrast, the Eurozone entered a recession earlier this year after energy prices spiked following the drop in gas flows from Russia, which was once its largest energy supplier. Despite its efforts, the European Central Bank has been unable to bring inflation in the region to the target level and turn the economy towards growth. According to a recent ECB forecast, Eurozone GDP growth is expected to slow to 0.9% by the end of the year from 3.5% in 2022.
DNA testing shows that all those listed on the flight manifest were indeed on board, the Investigative Committee has said
Russia’s Investigative Committee has confirmed the death of Evgeny Prigozhin, the chief of private military company Wagner Group, in a plane crash earlier this week.
In a statement on Sunday, Svetlana Petrenko, the committee’s chief spokesperson, said that Russian investigators had completed DNA testing of the bodies of those who were on board the Embraer 135BJ Legacy 600 plane. The jet went down in Tver Region on Wednesday as it was flying from Moscow to St. Petersburg.
“The identities of all 10 of the deceased have been established, [and] they correspond to the flight list,” Petrenko said.
The document in question had already been shared by Russia's Federal Air Transport Agency and included Prigozhin and several other high-ranking Wagner operatives, including Dmitry Utkin – said to be the co-founder of the PMC – and Valery Chekalov, whom the US considered to be the deputy head of the group.
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August 27, 2023 at 01:43AM
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The bloc’s combined GDP already exceeds that of the G7, and the gap will widen further once six new members join next year
The addition of six new member states will propel the BRICS group of countries far ahead of its major rival, the G7, in economic terms, several Russian media outlets reported this week, citing calculations based on global data.
BRICS currently consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, but next January it will admit Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.
According to reports from the news outlets RBK and TASS, the combined gross domestic product (GDP) of the expanded BRICS in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP) will be roughly $65 trillion. This would see the bloc’s share of global GDP rise from the current 31.5% to 37%. In comparison, the share of the G7 group of advanced economies is currently around 29.9%.
Furthermore, with the addition of the new members, BRICS nations will account for almost half of the world’s food production. In 2021, the group’s wheat harvest amounted to 49% of the globe’s total. The share of the G7 was 19.1%. BRICS will also have an advantage in terms of the production of metals used in the high-tech industry. The 11 nations will account for 79% of global aluminum output, against just 1.3% controlled by the G7. For palladium, the disparity is 77% for BRICS versus 6.9% for the G7.
The expanded BRICS will account for roughly 38.3% of the globe’s industrial production, versus 30.5% for the G7. However, the latter will retain the advantage in terms of exports, with a share of 28.8% against 23.4% for BRICS.
Saudi Arabia has the largest economy among the new BRICS member states. Its GDP in dollar terms at the end of 2022 was estimated at $1.1 trillion. Meanwhile, the UAE will be a formidable addition to the bloc thanks to its status as a major exporter. Its exports of goods in 2022 amounted to nearly $600 billion.
Overall, the 11 BRICS countries will account for 48.5 million square kilometers, representing 36% of the world’s land area. This is more than double that of the G7. The combined population will amount to 3.6 billion, 45% of the globe’s total and more than four times above the G7.
