Morocco has never considered to respond positively to the invitation to attend the “BRICS/Africa” meeting scheduled to be held in South Africa, or to take part in this meeting at any level whatsoever, an authorized source from the Foreign Ministry said, adding that Rabat advocates a multilateralism that does not divide.

Some media reports have recently alluded to a hypothetical bid by the Kingdom to join the “BRICS” group, as well as its possible participation in the next “BRICS/Africa” meeting, scheduled for August 24 in Johannesburg, South Africa. In response to these reports, the authorized source made it clear that this was not a BRICS or African Union initiative, but an invitation from South Africa, in its national capacity.

Morocco has not applied to join the BRICS and will not attend the BRICS-Africa meeting in South Africa, the authorized diplomatic source said, adding that Rabat advocates a multilateralism that does not divide.

The official denied the news circulating in the media citing South Africa’s foreign minister mentioning Morocco applied to join the grouping, formed by Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.

“Morocco does indeed maintain substantial and promising bilateral relations with the other four members of the Group, and is even linked to three of them by Strategic Partnership Agreements. However, the Kingdom has never formally applied for membership of the BRICS group,” the diplomatic source said.

Morocco’s future ties with the group are to be governed by the strategic directives of King Mohammed VI, the source said.

Morocco remains attached to a multilateralism that “should not be used to encourage division or interfere in the internal affairs of sovereign States, nor should they create precedents that could, one day or another, turn against their initiators.”

South African hostility

On the unilaterally organized BRICS-Africa meeting in South Africa later this month, the source said Morocco would not attend.

“It’s a meeting organized on the basis of a unilateral initiative by the South African government”, says the same source, adding that Morocco has therefore assessed this invitation in the light of its strained bilateral relationship with this country.

“South Africa has always shown a primary hostility towards the Kingdom, and has systematically taken negative and dogmatic positions on the question of the Moroccan Sahara,” he said.

“Pretoria has thus multiplied, both nationally and within the African Union, its notoriously malicious actions against Morocco’s higher interests,” the diplomatic source said.

South African diplomacy is known for its sloppiness, improvised and unpredictable management when it comes to organizing this kind of event, it said.

As proof, the source adds, the deliberate and provocative breaches of protocol that marked Morocco’s invitation to this meeting. Worse still, many countries and entities appear to have been invited arbitrarily by the host country, without any real basis or prior consultation with the other member countries of the BRICS Group.

“It had thus become clear that South Africa was going to hijack this event from its nature and purpose, to serve a hidden agenda”, says the same source, noting that Morocco consequently ruled out, from the outset, any favorable reaction to the South African invitation.