US President Donald Trump threatened Sunday night to impose “an ADDITIONAL 10% tariff on any country that aligns with the anti-US policies of the BRICS,” in a message posted on his Truth social network. This came just hours after the Global South geopolitical bloc closed the first day of its summit in Rio de Janeiro. In its final statement, the group, made up of 11 member countries representing 40% of global GDP, criticized Trump’s tariff war, without mentioning him directly for fear of retaliation.
“The proliferation of trade-restrictive measures, whether through indiscriminate tariff increases (…) or through protectionism under the pretext of environmental objectives, threatens to further reduce world trade, disrupt global supply chains, (…) exacerbate existing economic disparities and affect the prospects for global economic development,” says the document agreed upon by the group founded in 2009 by Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa and which was joined by Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates, Indonesia and Iran in 2023.
The signatories also support the entry of two of its partners, Ethiopia and Iran, into the World Trade Organization (WTO), whose rules Trump has dynamited, while, paradoxically, China, which joined in 2001, and the BRICS have become its greatest defenders.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry has responded to Trump by stating that"the use of tariffs benefits no one," a spokesperson said during his daily briefing.
The Kremlin, for its part, has emphasized that"cooperation within the BRICS has never been and will never be directed against third countries," according to its spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, according to Reuters. The Russian spokesman added that the BRICS aim to"share a common worldview on how to cooperate based on their own interests."
Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the summit's host, brushed aside Trump's threats in his first address of the day, which focused on BRICS efforts to combat climate change and health cooperation.
Trump warned in his message that"there will be no exceptions to this policy," referring to an additional 10% tariff. He didn't single out specific countries, but in their expansion process, the BRICS created the category of associate countries last year, which include Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Nigeria, Thailand, Uganda, and Uzbekistan.
This Wednesday, the 9th, marks the deadline Trump set for himself to reach trade agreements with his partners or impose a protectionist regime unprecedented in decades. The White House is predicting that it will finally take effect on August 1st, which threatens the global economy.
The main demand shared by the BRICS is the need to undertake a profound reform of multilateral institutions so that the countries of the so-called"local South," those traditionally underrepresented, increase their share of power in international organizations to reflect their current economic and demographic weight, not that of the end of World War II."If international governance does not reflect the new multipolar reality of the 21st century, it is up to the BRICS to help bring it up to date," according to Lula.
In his inaugural address, the Brazilian president drew a parallel with the Non-Aligned Movement, a group of developing nations that avoided alignment with the blocs led by the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. “The BRICS are heirs to the Non-Aligned Movement,” the Brazilian said. “With multilateralism under attack, our autonomy is once again at stake.”
For the fourth time, Brazil is a BRICS Cupola. Of all of them, this is where the most adverse global scenario occurs. The UN completes ten years on June 26 and we witness a parallel collapse of multilateralism.
— Lula (@LulaOficial) July 6, 2025
The advent of the UN marks the defeat of Nazi-fascism and…
The BRICS also agreed at the annual meeting of their bank, the New Development Bank, also held in Rio, to promote the use of local currencies, but without taking the step of creating their own. Months ago, before he had even begun his second term but was already president-elect, Trump threatened the BRICS with 100% tariffs if they dared to create a new currency to replace the dollar.
Brazilian Finance Minister Fernando Haddad explained in an interview with EL PAÍS on the sidelines of the summit that"the path outlined is not to replace it [the dollar], that will depend on the evolution of the US economy. My proposal is that our partners in Mercosur, the BRICS, reduce costs through internal trade and mutual loans."
President Xi Jinping did not attend the BRICS summit in Rio, which diminished the significance of the meeting. Meanwhile, his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, spoke via video from Russia in light of the international arrest warrant against him for war crimes in Ukraine.
Brazil, which will also host the UN climate summit in November, has used both meetings to highlight the seriousness with which developing countries are addressing climate change, while Trump has stymied US climate initiatives.
