This year’s BRICS Summit, the annual gathering of the world’s leading emerging economies, was held virtually on Thursday and the conversations were dominated by Afghanistan. The summit was chaired by India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Other leaders who attended the summit were Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro, President Xi Jinping of China, Russian President Vladimir Putin, and South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa.

Russian President Putin slammed the United States at the BRICS summit for giving birth to a “new crisis” in Afghanistan and further called the five country representatives to pay “special attention” to the war-torn country, which is now headed by the Taliban.

He said, “The US and its allies withdrawal from Afghanistan has led to a new crisis and it is still unclear how this will affect regional and global security”, according to PTI reports.

Putin added, “I am confident that we can ensure progressive development of the international relations only through guaranteeing the co-existence of states with different political and social systems.”

India’s Ministry of External Affairs Secretary Sanjay Bhattacharyya said that India focused on highlighting four priorities of the chairship, which was previously secured by India in 2016.

The priorities included enhancing people-to-people engagements, reform of the multilateral system, Using technological or digital solutions for attaining the Sustainable Development Goals and counter-terrorism cooperation, news agency ANI reported.

The BRICS adopted a counter-terrorism action plan, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Thursday while chairing a virtual summit of the five-nation grouping, PTI reported.

Russian President Vladimir also reaffirmed continued cooperation with other members of BRICS. He said, “I expect our work today to be substantive and fruitful and I would like to point out once again that Russia is ready to continue close cooperation with all BRICS members in all fields.”