5 out 6 of countries accepted BRICS membership: South Africa FM
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The first official confirmation has been made by the South African Foreign Ministry after the 2023 summit in Johannesburg.
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From left, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and China Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao attend the BRICS Business meeting as part of a three-day summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, on August 22, 2023. (AP)
Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates have all confirmed that they will be joining the BRICS bloc after receiving invitations from the trans-national group last year, South Africa's Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor said on Wednesday.
These five countries were extended invitations along with Argentina at the Johannesburg summit in August 2023, to join founding members, Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.
Argentina has declined the invitation to join after far-right President Javier Milei took office in December 2023.
"With respect to the BRICS confirmations, five out of the six have confirmed. That is Saudi Arabia, UAE, Ethiopia, Iran ... and Egypt," Pandor told a news conference on Wednesday.
"Argentina has written to indicate that they will not act on this successful application by the previous administration to become full members of BRICS, and we accept their decision."
BRICS aims to remodel the global world order
Recently, the aforementioned nations have made bilateral attempts to opt for the use of national currencies in bilateral trade, rather than the US dollar (USD). BRICS+ is expected to play the role of elevating these bilateral agreements into a sustainable and well-worked monetary policy.
Scraping the USD from international trade will mark a milestone for BRICS+, which includes several countries that have been sanctioned by the US, hindering their access to international banking systems.
Supporters expect the organization to play a differential role in establishing the Global South's position on the regional stage. China's role is crucial, as the country's growing and leading economic standing will allow for the proliferation of monetary independence, while other regional players are expected to play supplementary roles, considering their exceptional standing in various fields.
Read more: Iran to work on dedollarization of transactions within BRICS: Tehran
Outgrowing the Global North
The organization will now include six of the world's top 10 oil-producing countries, namely, Saudi Arabia, Russia, China, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates. Additionally, the group will now encompass around 3.6 billion individuals of the world's population, corresponding to 44% of the global population.
Earlier on Tuesday, the head of the Russian Central Bank, Elvira Nabiullina, stated that BRICS has overtaken the Western G7 group in terms of share in Global GDP.
As new members joined, the group’s share in global output rose from 31% to 35% as of the end of 2023, he added. This is based on the GDP in terms of the PPP (purchasing power parity) metric. The latter compares economic productivity and standards of living between countries by checking the differences in the cost of goods and services.
Nabiullina stressed that BRICS's role now is very vital, stating, “BRICS economies are developing quite quickly."
