Following the 10th BRICS summit, which was held in Johannesburg, South Africa between July 25-27, the Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has expressed his hope that Turkey will be accepted into the bloc. Erdogan pointed out that the bloc has expressed its willingness to expand its membership, and that with Turkey already being a part of the G20 alongside the BRICS countries, that a platform of cooperation to some degree is already present, and that since the BRICS countries are not opposed to the accession of Turkey, that he wishes they will soon permit it so.
TASS reports:
Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has called on the leaders of the BRICS nations, namely Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa to let his country join the association, the Hurriyet Daily News reported on Sunday.
“If you take us in the name of the platform would become BRICST, I said,” he told reporters in South Africa’s Johannesburg, where the BRICS leaders held a summit, on July 27.
The paper said, citing the Turkish leader, that his initiative was welcomed by the BRICS members. “Especially China says that it stands in favor of enlargement. I have seen that they are considering involving other countries in this platform. They are not opposed to it,” he was quoted as saying. “We are in the G-20 with five of those countries. I wish they take the necessary steps to let us in and we take our place in the BRICS.”
The tenth BRICS summit was held in South Africa’s Johannesburg on July 25 through 27. The leaders discussed issues of strengthening multilateral ties and the organization’s role in ensuring peace and security. Erdogan was invited to the summit as the current chair in the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.
With Washington already threatening sanctions on the Eurasian country and various other political differences reaching their climax, Erdogan wants to be a part of a bloc that will provide additional support and leverage to Turkey’s opposition to certain foreign policy maneuvers which the West is actively engaging in, including the arming, funding, and political support rendered to Erdogan’s opposition, the Kurdish rebels which he has been militarily fighting for most of the year. Turkey has also been at odds with Washington over Turkey’s purchase of the S-400 SAM system from Russia, over which the United States has declared that it will buck Turkey’s acquisition of America’s F-35, which still hasn’t been delivered to Turkey. Since much of the discussions at the 10th BRICS summit dealt with opposing America’s foreign and trade policy, Erdogan could hardly hope to find a better route for expressing his solidarity against those policies while also getting into a broadened trade partnership.
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