North Korean nuclear crisis casts a shadow over China’s BRICS summit
Hosts want to ensure the issue does not derail its agenda during meeting of the emerging economies
The North Korean crisis will inevitably pop up when leaders from the five emerging economies meet in Xiamen, even though they will still focus on boosting growth for developing nations, observers said.
The BRICS summit involving Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa will kick off on Sunday in the Chinese coastal city of Xiamen, six days after Pyongyang fired a missile over Japan, rattling the whole region.
Both China and Russia are key trade partners for North Korea, and will be the most affected by the latest United Nations sanctions on the regime, especially China which accounts for about 90 per cent of North Korea’s trade.
Shi Yinhong, a prominent Chinese international relations expert from Renmin University in Beijing said: “The most possible discussion on North Korea will appear in bilateral talks between China and Russia”.
While other members like India and South Africa – and some of the guest nations such as Mexico – may not be as interested inthe issue as China and Russia, their views about the North Korean nuclear crisis may well be included in the final declaration, Shi said.
Despite being economically isolated, North Korea exports about US$3 billion worth of products and maintains trade relations chiefly with China, India, Pakistan, Burkina Faso, Russia, Thailand and the Philippines, according to Observatory of Economic Complexity.