Lavrov: At least 12 countries have expressed interest in joining BRICS countries

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced that at least 12 countries have expressed interest in joining the BRICS group.

Lavrov said during a joint press conference today with his Indian counterpart Subramaniam Jaishankar that the group intends to agree soon on criteria and principles for its possible expansion, adding: Before talking about how and when exactly BRICS expansion will start, we agreed as part of the five on criteria and principles for considering such requests.

On the other hand, Lavrov expressed his country’s high assessment of India’s position on the crisis in Ukraine, noting that today’s bilateral discussions touched on the special military operation in Ukraine, which aims to implement all the goals and tasks set by Russian President Vladimir Putin, as well as attempts by Western countries to impose their dominance on international affairs under the pretext of the situation in Ukraine.

On bilateral cooperation between Russia and India, Lavrov referred to the common interest in all fields to deliver petroleum materials to India, oil exploration in the region, building the Indian nuclear plant according to Russian designs, diversity in weapons and military cooperation, in addition to cooperation in the field of space and launching satellites.

Lavrov stressed that the trade cooperation between the two countries has reached more than 31 percent, as the volume of trade exchange is about 17 billion dollars this year, amid the two parties’ efforts to develop trade between them and bring it up to 30 billion dollars, pointing to the role played by the Joint Ministerial Committee for Trade, Economic, Technical and Scientific Cooperation. The Russian top diplomat stressed the importance of bilateral relations on the issue of the international transport corridor between North and South and issues related to logistics routes in the region.

For his part, Jaishankar affirmed his country’s support for a diplomatic solution to the crisis in Ukraine, expressing readiness to make all possible efforts to resolve issues related to grain transportation.

Jaishankar also noted the cooperation between the two countries over decades in various fields, including the economy, trade exchange, energy, space and the military field, and constantly striving to develop them, pointing out the importance of confronting terrorism, solving problems related to food security and preventing the spread of nuclear weapons in order to maintain peace and stability in the world and strengthen the multipolar global order.

NR