Tehran, IRNA – Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf has said that his country’s membership in the BRICS group and its independent financial system would help the Islamic Republic mitigate the effects of the existing banking sanctions imposed by Western states.
Qalibaf made the comment on Friday at Tehran’s Mehrabad Airport upon return from Johannesburg, South Africa, where he attended the 9th BRICS Parliamentary Forum.
According to Russian agencies citing the country’s finance minister Anton Siluanov who addressed the forum, the group of BRICS nation plans to create an alternative to the SWIFT international payment system.
Now, Iran’s parliament speaker hailed the plan, saying that it would help the Islamic Republic to have interaction with other countries’ banks, as Iranian banks are currently unable to use SWIFT because of Western sanctions.
Qalibaf also praised the great economic capacities BRICS has, which he said would help member states in their plans for economic development.
He said that BRICS members have a consensus that a handful of countries, which have a unilateralist approach and control the United Nations to pursue their goals, should be countered, and that other nations should paly a role in the new world order being shaped.
BRICS is a group of emerging economies, namely Brazil, Russia, China, India and South Africa.
In August 2023 and during their latest summit, BRICS members invited Iran and five other countries including Saudi Arabia to joint their group.
Participants in that summit also agreed to use local currencies in an effort to reduce dependency on the US dollar.
