Belarus officially becomes BRICS partner

Belarusian Foreign Minister Maksim Ryzhenkov has handed over a letter to Russian Ambassador to Belarus Boris Gryzlov about Minsk's readiness to officially become a BRICS partner.

This means that according to the procedure, the country is officially considered a BRICS partner from this very moment, Caliber.Az reports, citing Belarus media. 

"An official response to the written invitation is a mandatory element of the procedure agreed by the member states to obtain partner status. It is from this moment the country is officially considered a BRICS partner," said the press service of the Foreign Ministry of Belarus. 

On November 5, 2024, Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko signed a letter addressed to Russian President Vladimir Putin on Belarus's readiness to join BRICS as a partner.

In his message, the Belarus president emphasised that since its establishment, BRICS has been steadily strengthening multilateral interaction, becoming not just a symbol but one of the pillars of multipolarity. Not only the member states but also a growing number of the global majority countries are pinning their hopes for a just world order on this association. The spirit of mutual respect and equality and the attractiveness of its goals inexorably lead to the expansion of the BRICS. 

The list of BRICS partner states was agreed at the summit of the group, which was held in Kazan on 22-24 October. According to Putin, the final list will be made public after all these countries receive a positive response to the invitation to participate in the group in this format.

By Khagan Isayev