Jakarta. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Friday that ASEAN countries have shown interest in maintaining ties with Moscow, a statement made as the region and the rest of the world deal with the US’s monster tariffs.

Lavrov is among the foreign ministers attending the ASEAN talks in Kuala Lumpur this week. US President Donald Trump has sent his chief diplomat, Marco Rubi,o to join the meeting. Trump’s tariffs have cast a shadow on the Southeast Asian gathering as the region’s countries are about to have their US-bound goods subject to up to 40 percent import duties starting next month.

The talks took place just a few days after the BRICS’ Rio summit that saw Indonesia’s debut as a member. The Rio summit had angered Trump after BRICS indirectly criticized his tariff moves in their joint declaration. The BRICS countries had also condemned the imposition of unilateral economic sanctions. Not long after, Trump immediately threatened extra duty hikes on countries that aligned with BRICS' "anti-American policies".

In a press conference live-streamed by the Russian government, a reporter had asked Lavrov whether Southeast Asian nations were looking to deepen ties with BRICS economies, including the group’s founding member, Moscow, following the latest developments. Lavrov said ASEAN’s ties with Moscow had come into being years back -- long before the Trump 2.0 administration.

“I believe that ASEAN countries are showing interest in cooperation with Russia, independently of what is happening in the West and the actions of the US or their allies. They don’t have this thing where they would not be friends with Russia if the West didn’t put pressure on them,” Lavrov told the press.

“Our friendship started long before the current US administration started proposing sanctions, including tariffs. Tariffs are also essentially a form of sanctions,” Lavrov told the presser. 

Russia finds it unlikely for ASEAN countries to stay away from Moscow just to appease Trump’s tariff wrath. 

“I don’t see any sign in the development of our relations with ASEAN or BRICS. I don’t see any sign of a direct response by those countries to the sanctions. If you do have a choice where you can have trade within your association without any unscrupulous means being applied against your competitors, or you can trade with someone who wants to blackmail you, I think you will make the natural choice,” Lavrov said.

According to Trump’s latest letters, ASEAN countries will face tariffs at different rates starting Aug. 1. The rates for ASEAN countries are as follows: Laos (40 percent); Myanmar (40 percent); Thailand (36 percent); Cambodia (36 percent); Indonesia (32 percent); Malaysia (25 percent);  Brunei Darussalam (25 percent); Philippines (20 percent); Vietnam (20 percent). Trump has yet to pen a letter to Singapore, but the half-island state remains subject to the 10 percent baseline tariff. Trump had agreed to drop his initial 46 percent tariff to a flat 20 percent tariff on imports from Vietnam. 

Just a day earlier, Rubio had defended Trump’s tariffs in a press conference, saying that Washington was only trying to rebalance trade. BRICS' latest newcomer and ASEAN founding member Indonesia had also encouraged the US to support “an open, fair, and mutually beneficial trade” during the Kuala Lumpur talks.

Russia officially became ASEAN’s dialogue partner in 1996. The Russian government reported that its country’s trade with ASEAN had topped $17 billion in January-September 2024. The Indonesian Trade Ministry data showed that bilateral trade with Russia neared $4 billion last year. Indonesia-Russia trade also reached almost $2.4 billion in the first five months of 2025. 

BRICS is a group of major emerging economies made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. It has expanded to include Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Ethiopia, Indonesia, and Iran. BRICS has also recently welcomed Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam, among others, as its new partner countries.

Russia has been a target of American sanctions over its war in Ukraine. Trump, however, excluded Russia from his tariff list back in April, as the already existing sanctions had already precluded any meaningful bilateral trade.

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