Terrorism, cyber security issues dominate BRICS security meet

The top security officials of BRICS (Brazil-Russia-India -China-South Africa) also discussed regional and international issues, including conflict in Syria and situation in Libya.

Noting the mandate of their meeting, which was the first stand alone meet since they started holding parleys in 2009, was to look at the issues of common concern and international situation, National Security Advisor Shivshankar Menon said the aim was to "consult, coordinate and see where we can cooperate on some of these issues".

The meeting also discussed how the grouping, which now accounts for about 43 per cent of the world's population and about one quarter of world's GDP, can work together for the global peace, stability, growth and betterment, he said.

"Most of our discussions concentrated on important regional and global developments. Naturally, West Asia, North Africa was major part of what we discussed. Syria, Libya, Mali (also figured). We also discussed ways to enhance our cooperation and coordination in cyber security, terrorism and piracy and other such threats to international security," Menon said.

Observing that there was a "fairly detailed" discussion on cyber security, he said most of the BRICS countries were in the process of putting in place rules, structures and systems to deal with the issue, which "bothers all of us".

He said the discussions included exchange of best practices and ideas such as setting up of emergency response teams to handle the cyber security threat.

Noting that there was a "high-level of congruence" on most of the issues, he said now the delegates will report back to their leaders and the discussions will feed into the preparations for the Durban Summit of BRICS leaders at end of March.

On Syria, he said the view is that the process has to be Syrian-led and the BRICS nations are against military intervention.

He also talked about BRICS bank, saying the proposal was almost ripe and is expected to come up at the Durban Summit.

The new development bank aims at mobilising resources for infrastructure and sustainable development projects in BRICS and other emerging economies and developing countries.

Besides Menon, the other delegation heads were Ricardo Paes de Barros, Secretary for Strategic Actions, Brazil, Nikolai P. Patrushev, Secretary of the Security Council, Russia, Dai Bingguo, State Councilor, China, and Siyabonga C Cwele from South Africa.