Iranian president is invited to the BRICS summit in South Africa

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian said Tehran was ready to expand bilateral relations with Pretoria in various areas of cooperation. The diplomat also reiterated his readiness to hold a joint commission meeting with South Africa.

The IRI foreign minister made the statement at a meeting with South Africa's Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Naledi Pandor. The two sides discussed the current state of bilateral ties and ways to develop them.

Abdollahian said the talks he held with his South African counterpart on the margins of the BRICS+ meeting in Cape Town were constructive. He stressed the readiness of the Islamic Republic of Iran to develop full-fledged relations with South Africa.

The head of diplomacy also expressed satisfaction with the appointment of a date for a joint economic commission between the two countries.

For her part, Pandor reported on South African President Cyril Ramaphosa's formal invitation to President Ebrahim Raisi for the BRICS summit.

The two foreign ministers also exchanged views on some other topical issues of mutual interest, as reported by http://Iran.ru .

In May this year, Iran's president announced the country's readiness to join the BRICS association. The upcoming summit of the group's leaders, to be held in late August in South Africa, will discuss the prospects for countries to join the alliance. At the moment, the Five are in active discussions to determine the criteria and other modalities for BRICS expansion. According to Iranian Ambassador to Moscow Kazem Jalali, BRICS and the SCO have become a new pole of power in the world.

Iran became a full member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) the day before.

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