event
Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center

How Might Middle Eastern and North African Countries Affect the BRICS Group?

Thu. September 28th, 2023
Virtual

At a landmark summit held in Johannesburg, South Africa, this past August, four countries in the Middle East and North Africa—Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates—were invited to join the BRICS group as of January 1, 2024. BRICS countries have been seeking to reduce dependency on the U.S. dollar and foster a multipolar world in which the global South plays a more central role, ushering in a new era of economic and geopolitical cooperation. 

The inclusion of Middle Eastern and North African countries in the BRICS group raises several pivotal questions: Why did these countries seek BRICS membership? What unique interests and qualities can they contribute to the BRICS group? And what far-reaching economic and geopolitical consequences might arise from this expansion?

To address these questions and others, the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center is organizing a policy webinar on September 28, at 5:00 PM EEST. The speakers will be Alexander Kateb and Abdullah Baaboud. The discussion will be held in English and moderated by Nur Arafeh, a fellow at the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center.

Viewers may submit their questions to the panelists using the live chat feature on Facebook and YouTube.

For more information, please contact Najwa Yassine at najwa.yassine@carnegie-mec.org.

North Africa
Carnegie does not take institutional positions on public policy issues; the views represented herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of Carnegie, its staff, or its trustees.
event speakers

Nur Arafeh

Fellow, Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center

Nur Arafeh is a fellow at the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center, where she is co-leading the program on the political economy of the MENA region. Her research focuses on business-state relations, food insecurity, inequality, peacebuilding strategies, the development-security nexus and Palestinian-Israeli affairs.

Alexandre Kateb

Alexandre Kateb is an Economist and a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA). He is the founder and chairman of The Multipolarity Report, which he founded after twenty years of experience as an economist, policy advisor, and investment strategist. Kateb coauthored the Deloitte Policy Paper, commissioned by the Moroccan Investment and Export Development Agency (AMDIE), a government body, in 2021 as part of the MoroccoNow campaign.

Abdullah Baabood

Nonresident Senior Scholar, Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center

Abdullah Baabood was a nonresident senior scholar at the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Center. Baabood holds the chair of the state of Qatar for Islamic area studies and is a visiting professor at the Faculty of International Research and Education at Waseda University in Tokyo.