Russia's embassy in Havana said on 31 August that expansion of full BRICS membership is not on the agenda, after Cuba sought Russian backing to move from partner to full member of the bloc grouping Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa1. The summit opens in New Delhi on 12 September with Cuba still a partner.
Partner status carries no vote and no claim on what the members decide among themselves. Cuba's reason for wanting the upgrade is plain while its banks are being designated one by one, because the members have spent several summits discussing payment arrangements that sit outside Western banking, and a partner is not in that conversation.
The refusal also came at the lowest level Moscow could use and still be heard. An embassy statement in Havana is not a Kremlin position, and it commits nobody, but it answers a request in public and before the summit rather than at it. Havana therefore arrives in New Delhi with the question already closed. Cuba still carries a large UN General Assembly majority against the US embargo, and the EU and Washington pressed it on opposite tracks at July's embargo debate, so multilateral standing is not the same thing as a seat at this table.
