BRICS

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• EB5 BRICS will remain dedicated to leveraging our expertise in EB-5 investments so success stories like this become the norm.

• The NATO members did, however, commit to “constructive engagement” with the rapidly rising superpower.
• It accused the alliance of “smearing and lying” about China and warned against NATO’s outreach efforts in the Asia-Pacific.
• Read more:
  Why is NATO expanding its reach to the Asia-Pacific region?

How the US is challenging China

China’s strong reaction reflects its serious concerns over the global challenges it faces. These include:
• China also retains significant advantages given its close economic ties with America’s allies and partners.
• This will influence whether the US can successfully achieve what Beijing believes is its goal of containing China.

China’s strategy in response

• I’ve observed at least four tactics when it comes to this shifting foreign policy.
• It is deepening its economic ties with ASEAN, the 10-nation regional bloc,
  while also supporting ASEAN centrality in the region’s security structures.
• The Southeast Asian group is wary of being drawn into a US-China conflict and forced to choose sides.
• It is also concerned US-led initiatives such as the Quad could diminish its role in the region.
• By relying on institutions in this way, Beijing can promote its interests globally while avoiding direct confrontation with the US.

• This meeting is important for both regions but, especially for Europe, given the current geopolitical pressures it is facing.
• We live in a world in transition towards a new model that is still uncertain after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
• Several concerned Latin American countries requested the summit be suspended and called on CELAC to speak out against Nicolás Maduro’s regime.

Cooled relations

• The pandemic, the war in Ukraine and the Spanish presidency are the main factors that reactivated the EU-CELAC relationship at the highest level.
• The first two highlighted some of the EU’s major structural threats and weaknesses in terms of military dependence on NATO, Europe’s essential defence base, strategic industrial dependence and energy dependence – especially on Russia.

Spain takes the initiative

• In this context of European vulnerability, the Foreign Affairs Council of 18 July 2022 agreed to “promote a qualitative leap in relations between the EU and LAC countries”, with Spain taking the initiative to hold the summit under its presidency of the EU Council.
• It also includes green and digital alliances within the framework of the Global Gateway investment strategy.
• The EU needs a real strategic relationship with LAC, however complex and heterogeneous the region may be.
• However, it cannot accompany it in the application of sanctions – its strategic vulnerability can’t assume the cost of sanctions.

What success would look like

• The main success factor of the summit will be the abandonment of Eurocentrism.
• Taking that into account, the international value of Latin America and the Caribbean in the developing global scenario is incalculable.

• But what is meant by that term, and why has it gained currency in recent years?
• The Global South refers to various countries around the world that are sometimes described as “developing,” “less developed” or “underdeveloped.” Many of these countries – although by no means all – are in the Southern Hemisphere, largely in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

Going beyond the ‘Third World’

• Sociologist Peter Worsley’s 1964 book, “The Third World: A Vital New Force in International Affairs,” further popularized the term.
• Though Worsley’s view of this “Third World” was positive, the term became associated with countries plagued by poverty, squalor and instability.
• “Third World” became a synonym for banana republics ruled by tinpot dictators – a caricature spread by Western media.
• Increasingly the term that was being used to replace them was the more neutral-sounding “Global South.”

Geopolitical, not geographical

• The term “Global South” is not geographical.
• In fact, the Global South’s two largest countries – China and India – lie entirely in the Northern Hemisphere.
• Rather, its usage denotes a mix of political, geopolitical and economic commonalities between nations.

Global South on the march

• This economic shift has gone hand in hand with enhanced political visibility.
• Countries in the Global South are increasingly asserting themselves on the global scene – be it China’s brokering of Iran and Saudi Arabia’s rapprochement or Brazil’s attempt to push a peace plan to end the war in Ukraine.