ANALYSIS
BRICS in New Delhi: international law in the text, and who goes unnamed
September 26, 2026 — BRICS / Ukraine / Iran / International Criminal Court
Context
On 12 and 13 September 2026 the leaders of eleven States — almost half of the world's population, 27.9% of world GDP at nominal values and 41.0% at purchasing power parity (IMF, April 2026, our calculation) — met in New Delhi for the eighteenth BRICS summit. They adopted the New Delhi Declaration by consensus: 140 paragraphs, 45 pages. We read the full text, from the Indian government's official PDF, and searched it word by word.
The yardstick of this analysis is the text's consistency with itself: a collective document that claims to defend international law should name those responsible for violations by the same criterion for everyone.
What the text says
¶7 reaffirms the commitment to uphold international law and the UN Charter in their entirety; ¶22 condemns unilateral coercive measures, secondary sanctions included. On Gaza (¶30-33) the text is detailed: it calls for respect for humanitarian law, condemns starvation as a method of warfare and recalls the provisional measures of the International Court of Justice in South Africa v. Israel. On Lebanon (¶35) it calls on Israel to withdraw its forces. ¶40 condemns one specific attack, the one of 22 April 2025 in Kashmir (26 dead), without naming those responsible.
Where it does not attribute, where it is silent
No perpetrators. On the Middle East (¶28-29) the text asks for “maximum restraint” and describes deliberate attacks on civilian and nuclear infrastructure under IAEA safeguards as violations of international law, without saying who carried them out. On Sudan (¶37) it calls for a ceasefire without naming the parties; on attacks against UNIFIL peacekeepers (¶36) it asks that those responsible be held accountable, without naming them; on the “occupying forces” in Syria (¶38) it does not say which. Tariffs (¶21) and the embargo on Cuba (¶27) are criticised without naming the United States.
Absences. In none of the 140 paragraphs do Ukraine, the United States, the International Criminal Court or the Rome Statute appear. The 2025 Rio text contained at least one reference to the members' national positions on the war in Ukraine; in New Delhi even that has gone (The Print; Outlook India). ¶132 promotes cooperation among justice ministers, chief justices and prosecution services of the member countries, without mentioning the ICC. In the peace and security section (¶23-40) the only State named as a party is Israel; Russia and Iran appear elsewhere, for other reasons (Security Council, WTO accession, events and the joint bank).
Why. Iran and the UAE are on opposite sides of the Middle East conflict, and consensus was reached by separating “national positions” from that of the group (¶28; Outlook India). On 31 August the Iranian army said it had attacked the Emirati base of Al Minhad with drones; the UAE denied that the base had been targeted and said it had intercepted an Iranian drone over its territorial waters (Reuters; Jerusalem Post). Putin attended in person: India is not a party to the Rome Statute and has no arrest obligations under the ICC warrant, whereas at Rio 2025 he had taken part only by video link (Observer Diplomat; Wikipedia).
The text against two censuses
Two stable censuses, published before the summit and independent of the news cycle: the IRC Emergency Watchlist 2026 (16 December 2025) and the ACLED Conflict Index with the 2026 Watchlist (11 December 2025).
IRC, the 20 countries most at risk of a humanitarian crisis in 2026. The declaration treats four of them as crises: Sudan, the Palestinian territories, Lebanon and Syria. Ethiopia, fourth on the list and a member of the bloc, appears three times but never as a crisis (WTO, ICAO, COP32). The other fifteen do not appear: South Sudan, Haiti, Myanmar, DR Congo, Mali, Burkina Faso, Afghanistan, Cameroon, Chad, Colombia, Niger, Nigeria, Somalia, Ukraine and Yemen.
ACLED, the 10 areas to watch in 2026. The text covers the Middle East, Syria and Sudan; it touches the Caribbean only through Cuba, without naming the United States. Myanmar, Ecuador, Pakistan, Ukraine, the Red Sea and the Sahel do not appear. For ACLED the three deadliest places of 2025 are Ukraine, Sudan and Palestine (Palestine third, after Ukraine and Sudan): of the three, Ukraine is the one passed over in silence.
Caveats. A summit declaration is not a register of conflicts, and the absence of a country does not prove a choice. What matters is something else: among the conflicts it does cover, the only State named as a party is Israel.
The symmetry test
Naming Israel is not the object of the criticism: it has solid legal grounds, in the ICJ's provisional measures and in the UN resolutions the text itself recalls. If the same criterion of attribution were applied to Russia, Iran and the United States, the disparity would disappear. The test applies in the same way to a Western declaration that named some perpetrators and stayed silent on others.
The editor's judgment, declared as such. The text is a compromise among members in conflict, and silence is the price of consensus. An omission does not prove that governments approve of the conduct left unnamed, nor that they ignore it. It stands as a document of how the group treats international law when the accused is one of its own members. Declared limit: the same test has not been applied to comparable Western declarations, for example from the G7 or the European Union; that is material for a later piece, and until it exists the reading is incomplete.
Legal commentary
The obligation to cooperate with the ICC, arrests included, binds only States parties to the Rome Statute. Among the eleven members there are two: Brazil (2002) and South Africa (2000). Egypt, Iran and the UAE signed it without ratifying, Russia withdrew its signature in 2016, and China, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia never signed. That is why Putin's presence in New Delhi, with a warrant pending, breaches no Indian obligation: the choice of venue made it possible.
All eleven are parties to the ICJ Statute as UN members, but only India (2019, with reservations), Egypt (1957, limited to the Suez Canal) and Iran (2023, limited to State immunities) have accepted compulsory jurisdiction in advance: a minority among the world's States, which includes many great powers. The South Africa v. Israel case recalled in ¶33 rests instead on a treaty, the Genocide Convention. The country-by-country picture is in the BRICS entry.
Related: Two warrants, zero arrests · Fifteen Years for a Warrant · Who pays for the war? Ukraine's debt, Russia's frozen assets and a rule Europe will have to bend
Fonti: New Delhi Declaration, official text (Government of India, 12/09/2026) · brics2026.gov.in — Indian chairship · Al Jazeera, 13/09/2026 · The Print — no mention of Ukraine · Outlook India — Iran, UAE, Russia and China on the same text · Observer Diplomat — Putin in New Delhi · Wikipedia — Rio 2025 summit · Reuters via Times of Israel, 31/08/2026 · Jerusalem Post — UAE denial · IRC — Emergency Watchlist 2026 · ACLED — Conflict Index and 2026 Watchlist · IMF WEO April 2026, country data (StatisticsTimes) · ICJ — Article 36(2) declarations · CFR — Rome Statute · Wikipedia — States parties to the Rome Statute
Verification note: the text of the declaration was read in full from the Indian government's official PDF and searched by word; statements about absences hold for all 140 paragraphs. The population total and the reconstruction of the Rome Statute status (from secondary sources, consistent with CFR and the Assembly of States Parties) remain to be checked against the UN treaty archive. The GDP percentages are our own calculation on IMF data; the official site of the Indian chairship states “40%” without specifying the measure, a figure that matches PPP and not nominal GDP.