NATO’s Turkey is still interested in joining the BRICS

Turkey is not giving up on BRICS. Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said the country is still actively seeking membership in the economic alliance led by Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa after decades of being shut out of the European Union.

Speaking to Bloomberg on Friday, Fidan confirmed that Turkey is “exploring joining groups including BRICS” because it needs more economic options. “The EU was our first choice,” he said. “If we cannot be part of the EU, then other alternatives are always on the table.”

Turkey, while officially a NATO member, has increasingly positioned itself as a neutral power between the East and West. The country has refused to join Western sanctions on Russia and has maintained strong trade and energy ties with Moscow, even as NATO allies criticize its decision-making.

Turkey officially applied for BRICS membership in November 2024 but was only given “partner-country status,” a secondary position that does not come with voting rights or full membership benefits. Fidan made it clear that Ankara is not satisfied with that status.

“We are interested, but we have not been offered a membership yet,” Fidan said at the G-20 foreign ministers’ summit in Johannesburg, South Africa on Friday.

As aforementioned, Turkey’s push toward BRICS is a direct result of its longstanding failure to gain entry into the EU. The country first applied for EU membership in 1987, but its candidacy has been stuck in negotiations for over three decades now.

Brussels has repeatedly blocked Ankara’s entry, citing concerns over human rights, democratic standards, and political differences. During his interview, Fidan dismissed those reasons, saying that the real issue is cultural discrimination.

Ankara has long accused the EU of deliberately stalling its membership because it is a Muslim-majority nation.

Turkey’s push for multilateral action is reflected in its approach to Africa, where it has forged ties with countries like Somalia on counterterrorism. “Turkey is offering an opportunity for some African countries,” Fidan said.

The BRICS expansion and de-dollarization

The BRICS group has added five new members in the past year, including Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Ethiopia, Egypt, and Indonesia. Saudi Arabia has also been invited but has not made a final decision yet.

Turkey, along with Malaysia and Thailand, is one of the latest nations who want to join the group. Fidan told Bloomberg that: “In the modern world, no one country can alone overcome economic and political issues. Self-help is on the menu for every nation-state.”

Turkey is particularly interested in BRICS’s financial cooperation, which includes efforts to reduce reliance on the US dollar in global trade. The bloc has been pushing for de-dollarization, with many members already settling oil and trade transactions in their local currencies instead of the dollar.

This has drawn a direct response from Donald Trump, who will return to the White House in 2025. US President Donald Trump has threatened economic retaliation against any country that ditches the greenback.

“The idea that the BRICS Countries are trying to move away from the Dollar while we stand by and watch is OVER. We are going to require a commitment from these seemingly hostile countries that they will neither create a new BRICS currency, nor back any other currency to replace the mighty US dollar or, they will face 100% Tariffs, and should expect to say goodbye to selling into the wonderful US economy,” Trump said in a Truth Social post even before he won the Nov. 5 elections.

Russia and China, the two leading voices in BRICS, have been the biggest drivers of de-dollarization. Moscow, which has been cut off from Western financial systems due to US sanctions, is pushing for a BRICS-based cross-border payment system that would operate outside Washington’s influence.

The New Development Bank (NDB), the BRICS-led financial institution, has also ramped up lending. Since its launch in 2015, the bank has approved nearly $33 billion in loans, focusing on infrastructure and development projects in member states. But that figure is still much lower than the World Bank’s $117.5 billion in commitments for 2024.

BRICS’s ultimate goal is to create a multipolar world order, moving power away from the United States and Europe. China, in particular, has been actively pulling Global South nations into its economic orbit to challenge Western financial dominance.

But the expansion has created tensions within BRICS itself as India is against it, in fears that it would turn into a pro-China alliance. Brazil was hesitant too, worried about damaging its carefully-cultivated ties with the US and Europe.

When Biden was president, Russia was the leading voice behind sticking it to America, but Trump’s win might’ve messed with that plan as presidents Putin and Trump rekindle their friendship, so the former said he was no longer interested in dethroning USD.

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