Russian President Vladimir Putin will soon be making his way to South Africa, along with some of Russia’s top government officials.
Putin is visiting South Africa to attend the BRICS summit, taking place from 25 to 27 July this year in Johannesburg. The last time President Putin visited South Africa was for the BRICS Summit five years ago, held in Durban. His last and only state visit in SA was in 2006.
Russian embassy press attaché Alexander Kulyaev told TimesLive that the places Putin would visit while in the country will depend on the BRICS Summit program directors.
Kulyaev said the Cradle of Humankind was one of the potential places that the BRICS delegation could visit.
“Everything is changing by the minute and it is difficult to confirm who is coming. However‚ there will be a big delegation of ministers who will accompany the president.”
Kulyaev also confirmed more than a dozen ministers from Russia would attend including Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sergey Lavrov.
The BRICS Summit takes place once a year and the name of the summit is an acronym representing the world leading emerging economies, namely Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
Discussions at the event revolve around political and socio-economic coordination while giving the chance to act on business opportunities and areas of cooperation.
The first BRICS Summit took place in 2009 in the Russian Federation and focused on issues such as reform of the global financial architecture.
South Africa was invited to join BRIC in December 2010, after which the group adopted the acronym BRICS. Former South African President Jacob Zuma subsequently attended the third BRICS Summit in Sanya, China, in March 2011.
This years summit is a seminal milestone for the BRICS cooperation, as it represents a decade of BRICS cooperation of the highest diplomatic level.
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