“First of all, we’re providing an important platform for the Global South. You know, the Global South is over 100 countries, but here we have 11 key players from the Global South who collectively represent much of the diversity of views, as well as the range of countries that we are essentially chairing on this particular occasion. This grouping, the 11 BRICS countries, represents a majority of the world’s population and 41 per cent of global GDP,” Tharoor said.