'This man has no moral fibre': Ex-foreign secretary dismantles Navarro's rant on BRICS

Former Foreign Secretary Kanwal Sibal on Tuesday tore into Donald Trump's trade adviser Peter Navarro after yet another rant targeting India and the BRICS grouping. 

"Why does he have to rant so much?" Sibal asked in a post on X, adding that BRICS "is not an alliance” but a platform that has “functioned despite” India-China differences. He argued that global forums like the G20 show how countries can cooperate even when disputes persist. "G20 has India and China as members. Despite their differences India’s G 20 presidency was a great success," he said.

The former diplomat dismissed Navarro's attacks as hypocritical. "Chinese ships are no doubt in the Indian Ocean, but they are also there in the western Pacific under the nose of the US. Has the US been able to deny them movement?" he wrote. "China regularly practices an invasion of Taiwan. Has US been able to prevent these exercises? China is bullying Philippines. What has the US done to stop that?"

Sibal compared Washington's failure to check Beijing's actions with Trump's efforts to mend ties with Xi Jinping. "Now, Trump wants a big beautiful deal with China. Has retreated from huge tariffs applied earlier on China?" he said.

Taking aim directly at Navarro, he added: "This total hypocrite is excited about 50% tariffs on India but refuses to advocate tariffs on China. This man has no moral fibre in him besides being politically illiterate and economically obtuse."

Navarro has repeatedly accused India of “profiteering” from Russian crude oil imports and labelled New Delhi the “Maharajah of tariffs.” On Monday, he went further, describing BRICS as a group of “vampires” feeding off U.S. markets and predicting its collapse.

"I don't see how the BRICS alliance stays together since historically they all hate each other and kill each other," Navarro said in an interview with Real America's Voice. He mocked India-China ties, pointed to Chinese naval presence in the Indian Ocean, and suggested Prime Minister Narendra Modi could not "work that out."

The Trump aide also claimed Russia was "in bed with China" while accusing Brazil of “going down the tubes” under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.