Turkey is determined to pursue its talks with the BRICS group of emerging market nations, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Thursday after Ankara became the first NATO member seeking to join, Agence France-Presse reported.
Erdoğan joined the summit at the invitation of his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, after asking last month to join the bloc, which includes Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
“We are determined to further our dialogue with the BRICS family, with whom we have developed close relations based on mutual respect and win-win,” he told delegates at the BRICS forum in the Russian city of Kazan.
If admitted, it would be the first NATO member to join the alliance which sees itself as a counterweight to Western powers and whose members are sharply at odds with the West over several issues, notably the ongoing Mideast conflict.
“The political and financial mechanisms that emerged after World War II cannot deliver what is expected of them,” Erdoğan said.
BRICS, he added, made a “unique contribution … to the construction of a more just world” through “the development of global trade, economic growth and sustainable development goals.”
BRICS is an acronym for its five founding members although the alliance added four nations this year, three from the Middle East — including Iran.