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India is hosting the 18th BRICS Leaders’ Summit on September 12-13, 2026, at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi, and the timing could hardly be more fraught. The bloc that was supposed to represent a cohesive counterweight to Western-dominated institutions is walking into its biggest internal test yet: a shooting war involving one of its own members.
The US-led conflict against Iran, which began on February 28, 2026, has turned what was meant to be a showcase of multilateral ambition into a diplomatic minefield. Iran joined BRICS in 2024. So did the UAE and Saudi Arabia, two countries with their own complicated history with Tehran. Putting all three in the same room and asking them to sign a joint declaration about peace and cooperation is, to put it gently, a challenge.
The consensus problem
A preview of how difficult the summit might be came in May 2026, when BRICS foreign ministers met and failed to produce a consensus statement. Differing views on the conflict, and likely on how much to say about it publicly, left the group without the kind of unified communiqué that summits like these are designed to produce.
India, which has chaired the bloc since January 2026, is now scrambling to find language that 11 member states can agree on, a task that gets harder when some of those members are on opposite sides of an active military conflict.
The theme India chose for its chairmanship is “Building for Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability.”
Who’s showing up, and why it matters
Chinese President Xi Jinping is expected to attend, which would mark his first visit to India in seven years. Russian President Vladimir Putin is also expected, as is Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will host.
Oil prices tell the story
Brent crude is trading above $97 per barrel, driven in large part by shipping disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway through which roughly a fifth of the world’s oil supply passes on any given day. Prices have been flirting with the $100 mark.
For oil-exporting BRICS members like Russia, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE, high prices are a revenue windfall. For oil-importing members like India and China, they’re an economic headache that feeds into inflation and trade deficits.
What this means for the bloc’s future
BRICS expanded from five members to eleven in 2024, bringing in Iran, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Ethiopia. At the time, the expansion was framed as proof that the developing world wanted an alternative to US and European-led institutions.
The failure of the May foreign ministers’ meeting to produce a consensus statement is a warning sign. If the September summit also ends without one, it would suggest that BRICS has hit a structural ceiling on what it can accomplish as a political bloc.
For global markets, the summit outcome matters beyond symbolism. Any agreement on energy cooperation, alternative payment systems, or coordinated economic policy among BRICS members could shift trade flows and currency dynamics.
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