Despite its longstanding membership in the Western NATO alliance, Turkey this week confirmed its intention to join BRICS, a nine-nation economic bloc dominated by heavyweights Russia and China.
While the move is sure to raise hackles in Brussels and Washington, some foreign policy experts believe it is unlikely to affect Turkey’s long-term relations with its Western allies.
Turkish observers say the move constitutes a “natural reaction” to longstanding grievances—one intended to show the collective West that Ankara has “alternatives” to the NATO alliance.
On Sept. 3, Omer Celik, a spokesman for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, confirmed Turkey’s intention to join the BRICS group of nations.
“Our president has stated at various times that we want to become a [BRICS] member,” he told reporters in Ankara.
“Our request on this issue is clear.”
BRICS was established in 2006 by Brazil, Russia, India, and China, with South Africa joining four years later.
Since then, Moscow has sought to further expand the bloc as a means of countering perceived Western economic hegemony and creating a “multipolar” world order.
In the bloc’s first enlargement since 2010, Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, and the United Arab Emirates all officially joined BRICS in January of this year.
Saudi Arabia is reportedly considering membership, while Malaysia and Azerbaijan have also both formally applied to join the club.
In the event that Turkey joins BRICS as well, it will be the first NATO member to do so.
However, such a move would likely spark Western fears that Ankara, which already enjoys good relations with Moscow, was drifting further into Russia’s orbit.
Asked about such a scenario on Sept. 3, U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller declined to speculate.
“Turkey continues to be an important ally to the United States, with whom we work on a number of issues,” Miller told reporters.
The State Department did not respond to The Epoch Times’ request for additional comment by publication time.
‘Natural Reaction’
According to Ambassador Matthew Bryza, a former White House and senior State Department official, Turkey’s stated desire to join BRICS does not signal a shift by Ankara away from the West.“I don’t see this as a new threat to Turkey’s Western relationships,” Bryza told The Epoch Times, adding that the move was likely motivated by two factors.
“Firstly, a strategic tradition [in Turkey] of securing national interests via optionality rather than principled ideology,” Bryza said.
“And, secondly, a desire to spook the West a bit, both out of emotional spite and as a negotiating tactic in pursuit of concessions.”
According to Halil Akinci, a Turkish foreign policy expert, Ankara’s newfound interest in BRICS is a “natural reaction” to what he called the Western powers’ “persistently negative attitude” toward Turkey.
He cited a number of longstanding Turkish grievances with the West, including a long-stalled EU accession process that began almost 20 years ago.
First opened in 2005, Turkey–EU accession talks were suspended in 2018 due to what Brussels called “democratic backsliding” by the Erdogan government.
“At this point, EU accession is little more than a dream,” Akinci, who served as Turkey’s ambassador to Russia from 2008 to 2010, told The Epoch Times.
He also accused the United States of “acting contrary to Turkish interests” in the Middle East—particularly in Iraq and Syria—and stirring up trouble in the South Caucasus region.
“NATO is still very important for Turkey’s security, so the West believes Turkey doesn’t have any alternatives,” Akinci said.
But by moving toward BRICS—and, by extension, Moscow—Turkey is “showing the West that it does have alternatives,” the former diplomat added.
On Sept. 4, Yury Ushakov, a top Kremlin aide, said that Turkey’s bid to join the bloc would be reviewed at an upcoming BRICS summit in the Russian city of Kazan.
On the same day, the Turkish press, citing presidential sources, reported that Erdogan himself would attend the summit, which is slated for late October.
Conflicting Interests
Under Erdogan, Turkey has maintained good relations with Russia, with which it shares extensive trade ties and a lengthy maritime border in the Black Sea.While Ankara condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, it has declined to support Western sanctions on Moscow—to the annoyance of its NATO allies.
Turkey has also kept on good terms with Kyiv, which has allowed it to play the role of mediator.
“Turkey has not joined U.S. sanctions against Russia and has indeed sought to benefit from them,” Bryza said.
“But its political leadership has consistently stressed its opposition to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine,” added Bryza, who sits on the board of the Jamestown Foundation, a Washington-based think tank devoted to defense-policy issues.
“Turkey has also expressed support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity and provided important military-technical assistance to Ukraine,” he said.
Nevertheless, fears of a Turkish tilt toward Moscow were exacerbated in July, when Erdogan said that he hoped to bring Turkey into the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO).
A formidable bloc of Eurasian states, the SCO—like BRICS—is dominated by Moscow and Beijing, its two most powerful members.
The organization was founded in 2001 to serve as a counterweight to growing Western influence in the Eurasian region.
The SCO currently has 10 permanent members, including India, Pakistan, and Iran, along with four Central Asian republics.
Since 2013, Turkey has been an SCO “dialogue partner,” which is generally seen as a first step towards full membership.
In remarks to the U.S. press in July, Erdogan surprised many observers by declaring that Turkey sought to become a “permanent member” of the SCO.
“As a NATO member, we do not consider it a problem to interact with countries in the SCO, BRICS, [or] the European Union,” he said.
Erdogan added that he had already raised the issue with the leaders of both Russia and China.
Moscow has generally welcomed the idea of Turkey becoming an SCO member.
Following Erdogan’s comments, however, a Kremlin spokesman pointed out what he called the “conflict of interest between Turkey’s commitments as a NATO member and the ideology reflected in the SCO’s founding documents.”
According to its founding charter, the SCO aims to promote political, economic, and commercial cooperation between its members. It is also concerned with issues pertaining to joint regional defense and security.
In July, Russian President Vladimir Putin, at an SCO summit held in Kazakhstan, called for a new Eurasian “architecture” to replace what he called “the outdated Euro-Atlantic models that gave unilateral advantages to certain states.”
Last month, Turkish Defense Minister Yasar Guler sought to allay Western fears by stressing Ankara’s continued commitment to NATO.
“Our priority is to fulfill our responsibilities to NATO as an important ally and strengthen solidarity with our allies,” Guler said in an interview with Reuters.
He also said that Ankara would maintain a “balanced and active approach” to both Russia and Ukraine in hopes of brokering a ceasefire agreement.
According to Bryza, Turkey’s flirtation with BRICS and the SCO reflects Ankara’s “transactional” approach to relations with Moscow.
“Turkey has fought more wars against Russia than any other country,” he said. “It doesn’t want to be left alone against Russia.
“But it also wants to benefit economically and politically—whenever and wherever possible—from its relations with Russia, resisting Russian pressure while avoiding unnecessary antagonisms.”
