in his 27 Aug. 2023 interview on Asharq News with Bloomberg, EU ASEAN Centre director Nicolas Firzli looks at the likely geo-economic and financial results of the 15th BRICS Summit (Johannesburg, 22 – 24 Aug, 2023)
… much more than the premature notion of a unified “BRICS currency unit” which may eventually rival the US dollar (a long shot at this stage), or the soon to be formalized admission of Argentina, Ethiopia, the UAE and Iran into the BRICS club etc., it’s the addition of Saudi Arabia, at Beijing’s behest, which truly constitutes a turning point. The Biden Administration won’t “sit back and watch idly”: by accelerating its military-industrial and energy-production partnerships with South Korea and Japan and, some may say, surprisingly, “even Venezuela and Iran”, Washington is signaling to the rest of the world that “Cold War 2 can only intensify in the coming quarters”