At the opening of the BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia, this week, Russian President Vladimir Putin’ and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi engaged in an awkward handshake-to-bro-hug ballet. It was a fitting encapsulation of how the yearly meeting of “developing world” countries went

Putin seeks to use events like the BRICS to begin building an anti-Western, or, as he would put it, “multilateral” international system. But the events of the last several days in Kazan, while demonstrating that Putin is not necessarily alone on the world stage, also showed that his more grandiose aims are likely out of reach. 

The annual summit, now in its 16th year, began as an effort to formalize the multilateral cooperation between prominent developing and middle-income nations, known by their initials as the “BRICS”: Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. The bloc has expanded to include Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the United Arab Emirates. Saudi Arabia’s acceptance of formal membership is going through a “delay”—likely an equivocation to avoid angering its partners in the West. In total, the leaders of 36 countries were in attendance, and Russian foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov hailed it