A watershed Brics Summit in Kazan, Tatarstan

The recent pager and other electronic devices exploding in Lebanon – the works of Israeli intelligence Mossad – causing many civilian deaths and serious injuries shows the long arms of Mossad in launching a terrorist attack on Lebanon.
The dual terror attacks that rocked Lebanon recently were the result of a “complex and long in the making” Israeli operation, according to 12 current and former defence and intelligence officials who spoke with the New York Times (NYT).
Even before the late Hezbollah Secretary-General Assyahid Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah decided to expand pager usage, Israel had put into motion a plan to establish a shell company that would pose as an international pager producer,” the NYT report states, referring to Hungary-based BAC Consulting.
The shell company served as a front to manufacture thousands of pagers on behalf of Taiwanese company Gold Apollo that were acquired by the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah earlier this year.
“At least two other shell companies were created to mask the real identities of the people creating the pagers – Israeli intelligence officers,” the report states.
“BAC did take on ordinary clients, for which it produced a range of ordinary pagers. But the only client that really mattered was Hezbollah, and its pagers were far from ordinary.
“Produced separately, they contained batteries laced with the explosive PETN,” three intelligence officers who spoke with the NYT are quoted as saying.
On Thursday (Sep 19), Budapest announced that the explosive-laden pagers were “never” in the country.
“Hungarian authorities have established that the company in question is a trading-intermediary company, which has no manufacturing or other site of operation in Hungary.
“It has one head of operations in Hungary on its listed address and the devices referenced have never been to Hungary,” government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs said via social media.
The shipments from BAC started making their way to Lebanon in the summer of 2022 “in small numbers,” but production ramped up earlier this year after Nasrallah denounced the use of smartphones among its ranks.
“Over the summer, shipments of the pagers to Lebanon increased, with thousands arriving in the country and being distributed among Hezbollah officers and their allies,” two US intelligence officials told the western news outlet.
Referred to as “buttons” by Israeli intelligence, the pagers were activated on Tuesday (Sep 17) afternoon, sending “a message to them in Arabic that appeared as though it had come from Hezbollah’s senior leadership.”
Twenty-four hours later, Lebanon was rocked by a similar attack as hundreds of ICOM V82 “Walkie-Talkie” devices blew up across the country.
According to veteran journalist Pepe Escobar, the pagers that blew up or blinded 3,200 people including Iran’s ambassador to Lebanon were manufactured in the Czech Republic.

The shipment was purchased in early March by a Qatari, with delivery to Beirut.
The plot thickens when the Czech manufacturing company, operating under license from the Taiwanese parent company, Gold Apollo, is owned by a Jewish American.
The explosive device and the printed circuit board with the malicious code were installed at the factory in the Czech Republic.
The pagers which were equipped with tracking sensors were then shipped by sea from Hamburg to Lebanon.
Through these “compromised” pagers, which were used by Hezbollah fighters, Mossad could detect where Hezbollah operatives as well as civilians were gathering and where were they going.
Forty seconds before detonation, the pagers sounded a high-pitched alarm and self-destructed.
The pagers started to get very hot an hour before the explosion. A significant number of potential victims moved them away from themselves. But the 3,200 victims did not.
Let’s focus on Escobar’s version and move backward, beginning with the pagers’ journey from Hamburg to Lebanon. Where is Hamburg?
Answer: Germany – a European Union (EU) and Nato country that is a strong ally of the US and Israel with a lukewarm attitude with regards to the genocide in Gaza and rabidly anti-Russia.
We don’t know how the pagers had arrived from the Czech Republic to Hamburg. However, there is the same pattern here with regards to the profile of the Czech Republic – an EU and Nato country also lukewarm to the genocide in Gaza and rabidly anti Russia.
Moreover, the company in the Czech Republic is owned by a Jewish American company, perhaps an entity that could be sympathetic or an ardent supporter of Zionism.
Initially a manufacturing outfit in Hungry was pointed out by Taiwanese Gold Apollo as operating under license from it to manufacture the pagers.
As mentioned above, Hungary did a quick investigation and said no entities in its jurisdiction had manufactured the pagers. However, the media in Hungary pointed to a manufacturing company in Bulgaria that produced the exploded pagers.
Hungary’s profile is the same as the Czech Republic, Germany and Bulgaria i.e. EU and Nato-member country but with one big difference – Hungary is one of the two countries in EU and Nato that opposed the Ukraine war and tried to mediate between Russia and Ukraine to end the war – an effort opposed by the US, EU and Nato.
It really befuddles the mind on why the Taiwanese company directs a pointing finger at an entity in Hungary only and not at the entity in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria.
Perhaps a false-flag or disinformation exercise, with the intent of making official investigation on the pager explosion incident, if there is one, very difficult to proceed, what’s more arriving at a conclusion of what really happened.
But most important of all the supply chains and the trade routes (land and sea) of the exploding pagers – Taiwan, Hungary, Czech Republic, Bulgaria and Hamburg – are all pro-western supply chains and trade routes.
This makes it easier for a pro-western intelligence agency like Mossad to conduct covert operations using these supply chains and trade routes, like the exploding pagers and walkie-talkies incidents.

It also allows Mossad to modify en masse the pagers and walkie talkies at the production level.
Supply chains and trade routes are also important in another aspect – it makes it easier for the sole unipolar hegemon to weaponise economic sanctions and the dollarisation (the use of USD as a reserve currency) of the world economy since the end of the second world war.
Already the pager and walkies talkies explosion incident has weakened the western supply chains, courtesy of Israeli foolish terrorist act.
There is now a worldwide distrust of western electronic products arising from these explosion of electronic devises in Lebanon.
The logic is if this has happened in Lebanon, it could happen anywhere else in the world; if pagers and walkies can explode due to a terrorist act of Israel, then so do other electronic devices and appliances like smartphones, televisions, microwave ovens, refrigerators and washing machines.
No wonder the global sales of the latest model of iPhone has plummeted significantly since the pager and walkie-talkie explosion in Lebanon.
It is to be noted that western supply chains also include its Asian components i.e. Taiwan, Japan and South Korea because these Asian countries are rabidly pro-West and anti-Russia, participating earnestly in the US unilateral sanctions.
As for economic corridor, as early as 2002, Russia, Iran and India signed the agreement for the International North-South Transport Corridor(INSTC) project.
All three countries are founding member states on the project. Other important member states include Azerbaijan, Armenia, Kazakhstan and Belarus with other states having varying levels of involvement.
The INSTC is a 7,200-km (4,500 mile) long multi-mode network of ship, rail, and road route for moving freight between India, Iran, Azerbaijan, Russia, Central Asia and Europe.
The route primarily involves moving freight from India, Iran, Azerbaijan and Russia.
The objective of the corridor is to increase trade connectivity between major cities such as Mumbai, Moscow, Tehran, Baku, Bandar Abbas, Astrakhan, Bandar Anzali, etc.
Dry runs of two routes were conducted in 2014, the first was Mumbai to Baku via Bandar Abbas and the second was Mumbai to Astrakhan via Bandar Abbas, Tehran and Bandar Anzali.

The results showed transport costs were reduced by “$2,500 per 15 tons of cargo”. Other routes under consideration include via Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.
This will also synchronize with the Ashgabat agreement, a multimodal transport agreement signed by India (2018), Oman (2011), Iran (2011), Turkmenistan (2011), Uzbekistan (2011) and Kazakhstan (2015) for creating an international transport and transit corridor facilitating transportation of goods between Central Asia and the Persian Gulf.
This route became operational by mid-January 2018.
In November 2021, it was reported that a multi-nation transport corridor that would radically reduce cargo transportation time between India on one side and Central Asia and Russia on the other with Iran being the pivot could see dry runs beginning in 2022.
A three-day meeting of experts from 16 countries then discussed ways to smoothen the way for the INSTC and at least six supplementary routes, despite the US pushing its Silk Road proposal in which its bête noire (a person or thing that one particularly dislikes) Iran has been excluded.
Thus despite US opposition, the proponents of the INSTC still want Iran to be a transport hub for the Corridor.
This can be seen when the INSTC route through Azerbaijan allows India-Iran-Azerbaijan-Russia-Kazakhstan transport connectivity.
Iran started construction work to complete the missing link of the Qazvin-Rasht-Astara railway (205 km; 127 miles) and road including part of the Rasht-Astara section (164 km; 102 miles).
It involves construction of 369 km (230 miles) of bridges and railway line to link the southern sections to the northern ones. Once completed, 22 new tunnels and 15 bridges will have been added to the route.
On January 2017, it was announced the remaining construction of Qazvin to Rasht rail route is 90% complete and will be completed within 2017, whilst construction on the first section of the remaining Rasht-Astara section of road would also start in 2017.
Meanwhile India and Iran have a long-standing agreement, signed in 2002, to develop Chabahar, a free port (free-trade zone) situated on the coast of the Gulf of Oman, and is Iran’s southernmost city, into full deep sea port.
Bandar Abbas port handles 85% of Iran’s seaborne trade and is highly congested whereas Chabahar has high capacity with plans to expand it from its current capacity of 2.5 million to 12.5 million tons annually.
Unlike Bandar Abbas, Chabahar has the ability to handle cargo ships bigger than 100,000 tons.
Industry analysts have highlighted there are long term plans to integrate Chabahar with the INSTC, as “India is also eyeing trade with Europe via Chabahar port and the INSTC”.
A dry run of container movement via the green corridor (smooth customs facilitation) was conducted during April 2017 to test and verify the smooth customs facilitation, connecting India with Russia and Europe via Iran.
On July 2022, a Russian company RZD Logistics announced that it has successfully completed its first transport of goods to India via the INSTC. This statement was also confirmed by Iranian and Indian trade companies.

The positioning of the INSTC as an alternative to the conventional deep sea Suez Canal route is another major advantage, taking into account geo-strategic and economic diplomacy for all the involved countries, particularly Iran and Russia, both of which are subject to US sanctions, in addition to the fact that it is more cost-effective and saves a significant amount of travel time.
A survey by Federation of Freight Forwarders Associations in India found INSTC is “30% cheaper and 40% shorter than the traditional route via the Suez Canal.”
Efforts to develop the INSTC have intensified after Western sanctions forced Moscow to shift its trade flows from Europe to Asia, Africa and the Middle East.
The total cargo flow along the INSTC was 14.5 million tons in 2022, and the projection for 2023 is 17.6 million tons. By 2030, the volume is expected to reach 41 million tons.
In May 2023, Russia and Iran agreed to build a railway line to incorporate it into the INSTC. Moscow plans to invest more than $3 billion in the expansion of the project by 2030.
Russia has repeatedly said that the route could become a substitute for the Suez Canal, the 193km sea-level waterway in Egypt that connects the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea.
The popular route between Europe and Asia sees about 12% of global trade pass through it each day.
In March 2021, the Suez Canal was blocked for six days by a container ship that run aground. This obstruction costs global trade an estimated $9 billion a day in losses.
Trade via the INSTC is expected to allow companies to cut shipping costs by about 50% and save up to 20 days of travel time compared to the Suez Canal route.
As these developments will render the unilateral US and Western sanctions on Russia and Iran rather ineffective, in September 2023, president Joe Biden announced the US’ new vision for the region, dubbed the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (Imec).
A memorandum of understanding on Imec was signed by India, US, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (UAE), European Union, Italy, France and Germany at the G20 summit held in New Delhi on September 9.
The Imec comprises an Eastern Corridor connecting India to the Gulf region and a Northern Corridor connecting the Gulf region to Europe.
It will include a railway and ship-rail transit network and road transport routes.
As per the plan, the Imec will begin at India’s west coast, preferably the Mumbai port. It will be connected to the UAE (preferably Dubai) through the sea route.
Then a train link will connect the UAE to Saudi Arabia. The link will culminate at Port Haifa in Israel. From there it will be connected to Bahrain and Oman through sea route. Then it will be linked to Europe through a rail route.
Israel is all set to play an important role in the Imec as its ties with the neighbouring countries then are improving. In September 2020, UAE and Bahrain signed agreements in the presence of Donald Trump to normalise relations with Israel. Earlier, Egypt and Jordan had established formal diplomatic relations with Israel.
Hence, Imec holds significant potential to create complex interdependence among rival states (e.g. connecting Haifa port in Israel with the rail line passing through Saudi Arabia), which would be mutually beneficial and strengthen ties.
The Imec can also be seen as an attempt by the US to forge global strategic partnership that has the potential to challenge or rival China’s dominance in the Eurasian landmass via its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) which has already been decade long in the making.

But what’s more important is beneath the Imec façade lies also a US attempt to redesign the region’s security and trade architecture, ensuring its continued control over trade routes and the stability of its military supply lines in the region.
The absence of formal relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel is the only missing link in Imec at present.
Biden is trying to bring Saudi Arabia and Israel on the same page as far as infrastructure development is concerned. It is likely that the work on Imec will start even before they join hands.
As Imec will cut down shipping costs and transit time the gap between the Far East and Europe will be bridged. That will economically benefit all the participating countries.
Similarly, the Imec will promote connectivity between Israel and its neighbours in transportation, infrastructure and information. It will also upgrade global trade in the Middle East and also improve Israel’s position as a hub for transporting goods from the Far East to the west.
It is with this enhanced role of Israel in Imec that just before the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has presented to the UN a map that represents a new emerging Middle East without Gaza and the West Bank.
Just a few weeks after Imec was announced, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad met with Chinese President Xi Jinping in China and declared a strategic partnership between the two countries.
This came just a year after Syria joined the BRI. As part of this partnership, China will support Syria in reconstruction, counter-terrorism capacity building, and promoting a political settlement of the Syrian issue, following the “Syrian-led, Syrian-owned” principle.
The partnership is seen as China’s response to the Imec, aimed at securing its access to the Mediterranean Sea and connecting Syria to the BRI trade routes, thereby preventing the US from choking China’s maritime access to Europe.
Syria supports the BRI, the China led Global Development Initiative, Global Security Initiative, and Global Civilization Initiative, and will actively participate in them.
The Syrian war was intended to block the supply lines of Syria and the Axis of Resistance by ensuring the route was obstructed by terrorists in Iraq and Syria.

Hezbollah’s involvement in the war stemmed partly from its desire to secure its supply lines, which it has succeeded in doing in cooperation with Syria, despite relentless Israeli attempts to sabotage these efforts through airstrikes on the supply line route in Syria and Iraq.
The partnership with China provides Syria with an additional lever to secure its supply lines and maintain connectivity with the rest of the world, in light of continuous Western sanctions that have accompanied over 10 years of destructive war.
A few months before the announcement of the Imec, an earlier competing regional trade arrangement called the Iraq Development Road (IDR) was announced in May 2023.
The IDR is an ongoing project aimed at connecting Asia with Europe by establishing a network of railways, roads, ports, and cities.
The project will link the Grand Faw Port in southern Iraq to Turkiye’s border, with further extension into Europe. This initiative will position Iran and Turkiye as alternative hubs to Israel.
In August of the same year, Brics invited Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE to join the group – a move also seen as part of Russia and China’s attempt to redefine global trade routes and counter US efforts to isolate them from the global economy.
Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Egypt viewed Brics membership as a way to balance their relations between the East and the West, and to counterbalance Iran’s membership.
Domestically, Iran saw its membership as a means to break Western sanctions and further internationalise its economy.
Effectively, before the onset of Al-Aqsa Flood in October, numerous significant global trade projects were announced, all competing for access and aiming to leverage their respective countries’ geopolitical advantages to become key hubs in the global supply chain.
Israel, with the support of the US and its Gulf allies, aspires to become the primary transportation hub. Turkiye and Iraq seek to establish themselves as neutral trading hubs.
Iran, China, and Russia are backing Syria, although they are open to joining other arrangements if possible. Amid this fierce competition, the Al-Aqsa Flood occurred, altering the regional dynamics surrounding trade routes.
Hamas’ October 7 operation, the ensuing fighting and its continued ability to target Israeli ports and cities with drones and missiles, have signalled to regional actors that Israel may be unable to play an active role in the Imec in the near to medium term due to its involvement in the Gaza conflict and its focus on domestic issues.
The US has attempted to use the war in Gaza as a means to solidify the Imec by brokering a deal to normalise relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel – a key requirement for the success of the Imec – in exchange for a ceasefire in Gaza.
But Israel’s intransigence in its refusal to a Gaza ceasefire, much to the consternation of the US, has put a spanner in the works of the US to bring about a ceasefire there in exchange for normalised relation between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Israel also attempted to activate an alternative land bridge with the Gulf and India, but while this route has operated, it has seen limited success and volume, casting doubt on its prospects.
Meanwhile, Iraq has successfully courted Turkiye and Gulf countries, leading to Qatar and UAE signing up to the IDR, which can be seen as a hedging strategy against the Imec in case the war drags on for many years, as expected.
Although the US, Russia, and China are not officially part of the IDR, they are content to be associated with it.
Turkiye aims to be a hub for Russian gas to Europe and the world, while China seeks to use this connectivity to link the BRI to the broader global supply chain.
The Gaza war has significantly redefined global supply lines, particularly after Yemen decided to impose a maritime blockade initially targeting Israel, and later the US and the UK.
The maritime blockade was announced by the Yemen’s Ansar Allah government as a means of pressuring for an end to the genocide in Gaza.
The blockade has led to ships linked to Israel, as well as US and UK military vessels, being targeted in the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean, and the Arabian Sea.
In the wake of the blockade, Ansar Allah has stated that it is working with Brics countries and has reached an understanding regarding its efforts, indicating that Russia and China are assisting Yemen in becoming a regional maritime power, aimed at undermining the supply lines of the US and its regional military and trade allies.
Advanced capabilities, such as hypersonic missiles and air and undersea drones, have been used in these attacks, resulting in a significant reduction in ship traffic through the Suez Canal, which may suggest the involvement of great powers in arming Yemen.
The Israeli port of Eilat has gone out of service and declared bankruptcy. Many ships have been attacked in Haifa port and the Indian Ocean.
The maritime siege on Israel has led to increased shipping costs and longer delivery times. In response, the US launched Operation Prosperity Guardian in December 2023 to police the Red Sea, but it has so far failed to deter the blockade.
Israel announced its plan to integrate Gaza within the Imec and transform it into a hub for producing Saudi electric vehicles and exporting minerals to the world, according to a document released by the Israeli prime minister’s office.
As part of pursuing this new plan, Israel took control of Gaza’s only crossing with Egypt in Rafah to make it completely dependent on Israel for imports, exports, and travelling.
In August, Netanyahu delivered a speech to the US Congress where he outlined his vision for the region post-Gaza war.
In his address, he announced that Israel is working to establish the Abraham Alliance, an anti-Iran regional coalition, focussing on countering Iran.

It centres the resolution of the Gaza conflict on forming an alliance of Arab countries to administer the Strip after the elimination of Hamas, widely known as the “day after” plan.
Israel is attempting to reorient the region and link its future to annexing Gaza into the Imec, ending the possibility of Palestinian statehood, and replacing it with local proxies administering Gaza on behalf of the Israeli occupation and Gulf states such as the UAE and Saudi Arabia.
Israel wants regional actors to bear the economic cost of ending the war in Gaza in exchange for giving the Imec a higher chance of success and ensuring its future security.
It also remains hopeful that it can win the war and use this victory as a gateway to re-legitimise the Imec and its potential to become a regional trade hub.
Days after the speech in the US Congress, Israel assassinated the head of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, and Hezbollah’s second-in-command in its military branch, Fuad Shukr.
The severity of these targets and the manner in which the assassinations were carried out signalled that Israel and the US no longer view the conflict through the narrow lens of Gaza, but rather through the broader context of the future regional order, signalling their intent to challenge the emerging Axis of Resistance both individually and collectively.
Recognising the seriousness of the situation, the Axis has vowed to retaliate which is expected to draw the region into intensive conflict.
Today, the future of the Gaza war is intertwined with the future of the region and the world. The genocide is now about redefining global supply lines, not just about establishing a Greater Israel.
Israel has legitimised its actions in Gaza as part of a long-term effort to eliminate Hamas and secure the future of the Imec, indicating that it is not interested in ending the genocide anytime soon.
For Hamas and the Palestinians, ending the war is no longer possible without coordinating with global actors such as Russia, China, and the Axis of Resistance, who are seeking to redefine their involvement in the conflict with the aim of preventing the success of the Imec.
Its success would enable the US to continue using the region to supply military efforts against China and Russia.
China’s interest lies in ensuring that Gaza does not lose the war and in maintaining the blockade against US and UK ships, which would undermine their ability to intervene in a potential conflict in Taiwan that is provoked by the US.

For Russia, access to Syrian ports and the security of neighbouring Lebanese ports are crucial. Thus, Hamas and the Palestinians need to strengthen ties with Russia and emphasise the regional and global nature of the war.
Russia and China are already playing a more significant role in the Palestinian national reconciliation and exerting efforts to end the conflict.
Moreover, Russia has made a greater military commitment to the Axis, with media reports suggesting that it is currently supplying Hamas and Hezbollah with weapons.
Ansar Allah has stated that even if the genocide in Gaza ends, their actions against the US and the UK will continue.
This aligns with media reports from July that discuss Russia’s provision of advanced weapons to Yemen to support their regional maritime blockade against the US, the UK, and Israel.
China has also launched diplomatic and political initiatives aimed at achieving Palestinian reconciliation and a two-state solution after signing a strategic partnership with Palestine in June 2023.
As a result of Chinese efforts, representatives from Fatah and Hamas, along with 12 other Palestinian factions, signed a declaration agreeing to form an interim “national reconciliation government” for the occupied West Bank and Gaza after the war with Israel, in a meeting brokered by China in July.
The Chinese initiative challenges the US and Israel’s plans for Gaza and the Imec, offering an alternative where Palestinians maintain statehood and independence, potentially involving a greater role for China in the reconstruction of Gaza and the possible establishment of a Chinese-run port there.
Ultimately, the aftermath of the conflict in Gaza will be directly linked to the future of the region and global trade, thus, regional military escalation is expected, with the war likely to continue for many years.

At the forefront of the geoeconomic war of supply chains, economic corridors and trading routes is the dedollarisation movement spearheaded by the Brics collective.
To begin with, what is dedollarisation? To understand this phenomenon, one needs to understand first its antonym – dollarisation.
Dollarisation represents US dominance in global finances. It started in the 1920s when the US dollar began to displace the pound sterling as an international reserve currency.
After the US emerged as an even stronger superpower during WWII, the Bretton Woods Agreement of 1944 established the post-war international monetary system, with the US dollar ascending to become the world’s primary reserve currency for international trade, and the only post-war currency linked to gold at US$35 per troy ounce.
In addition, the US Treasury exercises considerable oversight over the Swift financial transfer network, and consequently has a huge sway on the global financial transaction systems, with the ability to impose sanctions on foreign entities and individuals.
Swift stands for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications system and it powers most international money and security transfers.
It is a vast messaging network used by financial institutions to quickly, accurately, and securely send and receive information, such as money transfer instructions.
However, rising government spending in the 1960s led to doubts about the US’ ability to maintain this gold convertibility, and gold stocks dwindled as banks and international investors began to convert dollars to gold, resulting in the decline of the dollar.
Facing an emerging currency crisis and the imminent danger that it would no longer be able to redeem dollars for gold, this convertibility was finally terminated in 1971 by president Richard Nixon, culminating in the “Nixon Shock”.
This refers to a series of economic measures taken in 1971 in response to increasing inflation, the most significant of which were wage and price freezes, surcharges on imports, and the unilateral cancellation of the direct international convertibility of the US dollar to gold.
By 1973, the current regime based on the de facto freely floating fiat currencies replaced the Bretton Woods system.
Another related concept to the dollarisation is the petrodollar, where all international trading in oil must use the US dollar.
Conspiracy theories abound that Saddam Hussain of Iraq and Muamar Gaddafi of Libya were murdered because they had the temerity to refute the petrodollar by advocating the dinar as the currency for their oil trading (petrodinar).
Hence Iraq and Libya – at the instigation of the US neo-cons were reduced to rubbles via regime change and became failed states to this day.
But when China and Russia dared to refute the petrodollar by using the yuan (petroyuan) and the roubles (petroroubles) in their oil trading, the US was powerless to turn the yuan or roubles into rubbles.
The dollar’s ubiquitous presence in global trade, finance, and investment has endowed it with significant advantages, such as lower transaction costs, reduced exchange rate risk, and the ability to finance deficits at relatively lower costs.
Also, its prominence has been underpinned by the size and strength of the US economy, the deep and liquid US financial markets, and the perception of the US as a bastion of stability.
Nonetheless, the US dollar has its own set of drawbacks, as it affords the US the “exorbitant privilege” to maintain large current account deficits and accumulate significant amounts of debt, which can contribute to global imbalances and economic instability.
In other words, this allows the US to spend huge amounts of money like water to become powerful and filthy rich at the expense of everyone else in the world.
Most of the money has gone and will continue to go to its military-industrial complex and funding regime change adventures.

The dollar’s dominance also renders other economies susceptible to fluctuations in US monetary policy, often leading to spillover effects that may not align with their domestic economic conditions.
Furthermore, countries with substantial dollar-denominated debt may face heightened vulnerability to currency fluctuations and capital flow reversals, exacerbating the risk of financial crises.
These factors, combined with the growing economic power of emerging markets and their desire for a more diversified and resilient financial architecture, have spurred many countries’ interest in going ahead with dedollarisation.
Hence, in simple term dedollarisation refers to an increasing trend in recent years towards trade that are conducted in non-dollar currencies between several countries.
This has been attributed primarily to what has been dubbed by leaders of several countries as well as many analysts as the ‘weaponisation’ of the dollar by the US – or imposition of strict sanctions on countries.
The most recent instances being a series of stringent sanctions imposed on Iran and on Russia (in the aftermath of the Ukraine war).
As pointed out by US Fed Governor Christopher Waller who recently said: “If these sanctions and policies are long-lasting, the shifting cross-border payments landscape, including the rapid growth of digital currencies, could also pose challenges to the dominant role of the US dollar”.
It is interesting to note Waller in the past has emphatically stated the US dollar is unlikely to lose its status of being the world’s reserve currency or its importance in trade and finance anytime soon.
According to certain reports, advisors of Republican Presidential Candidate and former US President Donald Trump have been exploring punitive measures against countries which are seeking to move away from the US dollar.
The dedollarisation process is very much related to the attempt to create an independent payment system to settle cross-border transactions among nations.
Russia, together with Brics countries, is working on creating its own payment system for the independent handling of all foreign trade, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced.

“In cooperation with Brics countries, we are working on creating our own payment and settlement system, which will create conditions for the effective and independent servicing of all foreign trade,” Putin said during the plenary session of the Russian Energy Week International Forum on September 26.
According to Putin, western elites are blocking access to the platform of fuel and energy technologies to undesirable countries, thus putting them on the sidelines of progress, but in fact simply squeeze them out of the market, as they cannot cope with competition, the president pointed out.
“I think many people will agree with me that all these tools are used primarily as tools of unfair competition,” Putin said, adding that the West does not want competition because it cannot cope with it, it often loses in a fair fight, the president concluded.
He went on to say the countries of the Global South with high birth rates will be the leaders in economic growth. “The leaders in terms of [economic] growth rates … will be the states of the so-called Global South, where the GDP per capita is still low, the urbanization rate is quite low and the birth rate is high. These are primarily the countries of South and Southeast Asia, as well as Africa,” he said at the plenary session.
The global economic growth in the 21st century will be concentrated in Brics countries and not in Europe or North America, Putin elaborated.
“There is an emergence of multipolar models of development that are triggering a new wave of global growth for the entirety of the 21st century … The main growth will concentrate not in Europe and not in North America, which are gradually losing their positions in the global economy, but in the Brics countries and in those states that want to join our group,” he noted.
With less than a month before the crucial Brics annual summit in Kazan under the Russian presidency from 22 to 24 October, serious informed discussions are raging in Moscow and other Eurasian capitals on what should be at the table in the dedollarisation and alternative payment system front.
A dedollarisation roadmap is expected to be introduced at this annual summit. Indeed, the event is speculated to be capped by the unveiling of key developments that will see it forgo usage of the greenback in favour of local currencies.
A new report states that the Brics is “expected to introduce a multicurrency platform along with a roadmap for a gold-backed Brics trading currency.”
These revelations would be monumental, as they would provide extensive challenges for the US dollar.
Since the introduction of the Russian sanctions in 2022, the Global South has facilitated a move away from the greenback. They have embraced greater local currency trade to great effect.
According to the Atlantic Council’s Dollar Dominance Meter, the global share of US dollar reserves has fallen since 2002.
The highly-anticipated Brics Pay system is set to be the bloc’s answer to Swift.
A Western-dominated payment platform, it will fast-track trade settlements in local currencies. Moreover, it should make those trade dealings even easier.
Yet, there is still consideration for a Brics native currency. Although this is more of a long shot, it would explain the bloc’s years-long accumulation of gold.
Furthermore, it would make trade within the bloc even easier. Once again, this creates an avenue where US dollar usage is not necessary.

Andrey Mikhailishin, head of the task force on financial services of the Brics Business Council, detailed the list of top projects under consideration at the Kazan Summit. These, inter alia include:
1) Brics Pay – a blockchain-based payment system that entirely bypasses the US dollar. About 159 participants may be ready to adopt this sanction-evading, similar-to-Swift mechanism right away.
Brics Pay is the platform that aims to make transactions between these countries easier in response to the need for a unified system with the main goal of boosting economic cooperation within the Brics nations by simplifying cross-border transactions.
It aims to cut transaction costs and time, decrease reliance on Western financial systems, and protect these economies from currency fluctuations and geopolitical tensions that impact global financial markets.
Brics has announced a new independent payment system based on the underlying technology of blockchain which will be the basis of Brics Pay.
Blockchain technology provides a secure and transparent way to record transactions, which is ideal for managing cross-border payments among the nations involved in this project.
It ensures that all transactions are traceable and immutable, reducing the risk of fraud and errors.
However, the main challenge is the integration of the existing payment systems of each country in a smooth way to make Brics Pay effective.
It must be compatible with the existing digital payment platforms in each country, such as Unified Payments Interface (UPI) in India and Mir in Russia.
The system should enable smooth transactions, meaning interoperability between different payment systems, allowing users to easily send and receive money across borders.

Establishing common standards and protocols can help facilitate interoperability and ensure a consistent user experience.
To handle currency exchanges within Brics Pay, the platform might use a real-time conversion system based on prevailing exchange rates or possibly introduce a stable exchange mechanism that could include features like a mutual credit facility.
This would allow currencies to be exchanged directly at agreed-upon rates, minimising exchange rate risks and enhancing trade efficiency among the member countries.
Brics Pay aims to create a robust infrastructure that not only supports efficient economic transactions but also fosters closer economic collaboration and stability among the Brics countries.
By leveraging blockchain and ensuring seamless integration with existing systems, Brics Pay could redefine how trade and economic interactions are conducted within this influential bloc.
According to its developers, Brics has implemented some basic solutions, including financial messaging, message conversion, Brics CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency), settlements and clearing.
Brics Pay will probably have a substantial geopolitical impact. If it is successful, the US dollar might no longer be the primary currency in a multipolar global system.
This could significantly impact the geopolitical balance of power and the world economy.
Moreover, regional trade blocs with their own currencies and payment systems could emerge and flourish. For instance, the Eurozone could deepen its integration, and currency unions like Asean+3 could become more prominent.
2) Brics Bridge – also expected to be discussed at the Kazan Summit is a platform for multilateral settlements and payments in Brics digital currencies, connecting the financial markets of Brics members.
This is the Brics Bridge, which bears similarities with the Bank of International Settlements-linked MBridge, already in effect.
This will complement intrabank systems already in action, as in the System for Transfer of Financial Messages (STFM) and Sepam (both being the Russian and Iranian equivalents to Swift respectively) settling financial transactions in their own currencies, which forms 60% of their trade.

Brics Bridge will help increase mutual trade between the member countries, Russian Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko said.
“The Russian Finance Ministry and the Central Bank of Russia together with Brics partners are working on the Brics leaders’ report on how to upgrade the international forex and financial system. It will contain a number of initiatives and recommendations.
“Consideration of this report may result in creating a Brics multilateral digital payment platform (Brics Bridge), which will help bridge the gap between the financial markets of the Brics member countries and increase mutual trade,” Matviyenko said.
Work on an independent payment system, “immune to political pressure, abuse and external sanctions interference”, is ongoing as a follow-up to the decisions adopted at last year’s Brics summit in South Africa, she said.
If this system is created, it may use digital currencies of the Brics central banks, and their exchange rate will be tied to the value of national currencies, Matviyenko said.
“In addition, this digital settlement and payment platform will be decentralized, that said, no participants will be able to restrict the activities of others.
“If the Russian-proposed initiative is approved, the Brics countries will have to conduct coordinated legislative work to put a national digital currency into circulation and use it in cross-border settlements,” she added.
3) Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) – on the issue of a national digital currency, by July 1, 2025, the largest Russian banks will have to provide their clients with the ability to conduct transactions in digital roubles, according to the Russian Central Bank.
Pilot testing of the digital currency is underway with 12 banks participating in it.
The digital rouble is an electronic form of national currency. It is a unique digital code – a token – that is stored in digital wallets on a special platform of the Central Bank.

The bank intends to issue it as an addition to the existing means of payment.
The digital rouble could become a fast, convenient and reliable means of cross-border payments, which is important for Russia in the context of sanctions pressure and exclusion from Swift, as well as its dedollarisation policy.
To seamlessly conduct financial operations with its partners, Russia needs a system based on the interaction of national digital currencies.
According to the Central Bank, there are two options: an integration of two platforms, i.e. the digital rouble and other digital currencies; or operations on national currency platforms through a third common system.
Together with the central banks of the Brics countries, Russia is working on creating a new settlement and payment infrastructure that will allow payments to be made in national currencies, including digital ones.
4) The UNIT Ecosystem – offers people around the world apolitical money that can be freely bought and sold or used as currency for payments via any open payment and clearing system.
It has already been discussed by the financial services and investments working group set up by the Brics Business Council and has a serious shot at becoming official Brics policy as early as in 2025.
According to Alexey Subbotin, founder of Arkhangelsk Capital Management and one of the UNIT conceptualizers, this is a new problem-solving system that addresses the key geoeconomic issue of these troubled times: a global crisis of trust.
Subbotin leads the UNIT project under the auspices of IRIAS, an international intergovernmental organization set up in 1976 in accordance with the UN statute.
The Global Majority has had enough of the centrally controlled monetary framework put in place 80 years ago in Bretton Woods and its endemic flaws: chronic deficits fuelling irresponsible military spending, speculative bubbles, politically motivated sanctions and secondary sanctions, abuse of settlement and payment infrastructure, protectionism and the lack of fair arbitration.
In contrast, the UNIT proposes a reliable, quick and economically efficient solution for cross-border payments.
It is a game-changer as a new form of international currency that can be issued in a decentralized way, and then recognized and regulated at national level.
The UNIT offers a unique solution for bottlenecks in global financial infrastructure: it is eligible for traditional banking operations as well as for the newest forms of digital banking.
The UNIT can also help to upend unfair pricing in commodity trading, by means of setting up a new – fair and efficient – Eurasian Mercantile Exchange where trading and settlement can be done in a new currency bridging trade flows and capital, thus paving the way to the development of new financial products for foreign direct investment (FDI).
The strength of the UNIT, conceptually, is to remove direct dependency on the currency of other nations, and to offer especially to the Global Majority a new form of apolitical money – with huge potential for anchoring fair trade and investments.
It is indeed a new concept in terms of an international currency, anchored in gold (40%) and Brics countries’ currencies (60%).
The UNIT token is not a cryptocurrency because its intrinsic value is determined by a basket of underlying assets, which includes 40% of gold and 60% local currencies backed by certain reserves and freely exchangeable into gold.
With all these expected to be discussed for implementation, no wonder the Brics Summit in Kazan is dubbed as an epoch-making event.

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Regards,

Jamari Mohtar

Editor, Let’s Talk!

P.S: Read our op-eds published by several news portals about the regional war in the Middle East, the end of the US Empire, the latest in the Ukraine war, the on-going Hamas-Israel war, unprecedented Hamas attack on Israel, Nagorno-Karabakh, Brics-11, the sanctions war imposed on Russia, the Black Sea Grain Initiative and China & Russia as peacemakers in the Middle East:

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