Trump Targets BRICS

US President Donald Trump is opening new theatres of his global tariff war. This appears to be a strategy he is determined to adopt even as his trade war is forcing some of the US-friendly countries to join hands with those with which they do not see eye to eye on many issues.

- SRI AUROBINDO

Trump betrays his increasing impatience by making the BRICS group of emerging major economies a new target of his tariff war. He has threatened members of the group, which include China and India, with 10 per cent tariffs on goods exported to the US in addition to heightened tariffs already on the horizon for some of them. As leaders of the group met for an annual summit in Rio de Janeiro recently, Trump thundered threatening on social media “any country aligning themselves with the Anti-American policies of BRICS” will face those duties with “no exceptions.” He then followed it up with the assertion that he intended to break up the group.