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| Prime Minister Le Minh Hung attends and delivers a speech at the working lunch session of the 18th BRICS Summit 2026, themed “Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainable Development: Shaping the Future of Inclusive Global Growth” in New Delhi on September 13, 2026. (Photo: VNA) |
New Delhi (VNA) - Vietnam’s participation in the 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi, India, last weekend as a partner country has opened up more space for itself to diversify its relationships, enhance its strategic autonomy and connect more deeply with new drivers of development.
The assessment was made by S.D Pradhan, former Deputy National Security Advisor of India, in an interview with Vietnam News Agency’s correspondent in New Delhi on the significance of PM Hung and the high-level Vietnamese delegation attending the most important diplomatic event of the year in host country India.
According to the Indian expert, the active participation and practical contributions of partner countries, including Vietnam, played a role in the overall success of the 18th BRICS summit. For Vietnam, its status as partner country offers an opportunity to diversify external ties and better align with emerging drivers of growth.
He emphasised that for Vietnam, the BRICS partnership should view as an instrument of strategic diversification. Vietnam could use the 11-nation bloc to expand markets, attract technology and investment, strengthen supply-chain resilience and amplify its voice in global governance, while simultaneously remaining firmly anchored in Association of Southest Asian Nations (ASEAN) and maintaining its partnerships with the US, Japan, Europe and other countries.
Citing India’s approach at the New Delhi Summit as an example, the expert noted that BRICS should be used to enlarge strategic space, not to narrow it. India worked to keep BRICS focused on multipolarity, development and practical cooperation.
Economically, he said Vietnam can do a number of strategies such as using BRICS to diversify economic partnerships, attract investment and technology, make critical minerals and supply-chain resilience a priority, participate actively in BRICS digital and AI initiatives, make the BRICS partner status an extension of ASEAN; deepen India - Vietnam cooperation through BRICS and work together to enhance their influence in the Global South.
Besides, he highlighted that the significance of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Vietnamese Prime Minister Le Minh Hung meeting lies in the fact that India–Vietnam relations are moving from “strategic trust” to “strategic capacity”.
Defence and security, rare earths, energy, space and the proposed 2+2 mechanism indicate a partnership increasingly focused on areas of long-term strategic importance, he added.
At the same time, Vietnam's participation in the 18th BRICS Summit as a partner country provides a new multilateral dimension. India and Vietnam can therefore become an important bridge between South Asia, ASEAN and the wider Global South, while both retain their strategic autonomy./.
