BRICS Opens To New States: Political Defeat Of The West

At the recent summit in Johannesburg, the countries of the BRICS group unanimously decided: starting July 1, 2024, the association will be officially expanded by six new member states. Argentina, Egypt, Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Ethiopia will join the founding countries of the group – Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.

International analysts saw this as a political defeat of the West, from the USA to the European Union, and in particular of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs Josep Borrell.

The trap was set by Argentina, which on July 18, at the summit of the European Union and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), surrendered – in words – under pressure from Brussels and announced a “postponement of its BRICS membership.” A month later, in Johannesburg, Argentina confirmed its membership in the group. “Becoming an integral part of BRICS is a great opportunity to strengthen our country,” President of the Argentine Republic Alberto Fernandez wrote on August 24 in an official message on the X social network (formerly Twitter).

Meanwhile, the columnist for the Berliner Zeitung newspaper Ramon Shack, in the article “The expansion of the BRICS group is the defeat of von der Leyen and Borrell,” wrote that “the expansion of BRICS was a decisive turning point in all world politics,” while the Western media continue to use derogatory terms like “meeting of developing countries,” which allows us to understand the true neo-colonial attitude of the West towards the states of the BRICS group.

The economic consequences of the expansion of the BRICS group will be more than positive. The reserves and therefore the financial capacity of the New Development Bank (NDB), the BRICS credit institution based in Shanghai, China, will be increased significantly. After the entry of new members, the economies of 11 participating states that comprise 47% of the world’s population will account for 36% of the world’s gross domestic product at purchasing power parity.