US President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday asked BRICS member countries to commit not to create a new currency or support another currency to replace it the US dollar, otherwise threatening them with a 100 percent tariff, Reuters reported, writes BTA.
„The idea that the BRICS countries will try to move away from the dollar while we stand by and watch is OVER”, Trump wrote in a post on his social network “Truth Social” on Saturday afternoon.
„We demand a commitment from these countries that they will not create a new BRICS currency, nor support another currency to replace the mighty US dollar, or they will face 100 percent tariffs and must expect to say goodbye to sales in the wonderful American economy," added Trump.
„They can find another “victim”. There is no chance that the BRICS countries will replace the US dollar in international trade and any country that tries should wave goodbye to America,” he wrote.
The BRICS group originally included Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, but since the beginning of this year it has expanded to include Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Egypt and Ethiopia, it said. “Financial Times”. Argentina had also applied for membership, but with the new libertarian president Javier Millay coming to power, the country abandoned that idea.
Although the US dollar is the most widely used currency in global business and trade, BRICS countries such as Russia, China and Brazil have called on the bloc to challenge the dollar's status as the world's reserve currency. The BRICS currency proposal was presented at last year's summit in South Africa, recalls the “Financial Times”.
In October, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused Western countries of using the dollar as a weapon, saying at the BRICS summit in Kazan that sanctions against Russia following its invasion of Ukraine were “undermining confidence in that currency and reducing its strength.&rdquo ;.
Threats of high tariffs against US imports from those countries follow similar threats made to Mexico, Canada and China earlier last week, in which Trump signaled he intended to use punitive measures to force the country's trading partners The US to comply with his demands.
Trump said he would impose tariffs of 25 percent on all imports from Canada and Mexico and an additional 10 percent on Chinese goods, accusing the countries of allowing illegal migration and drug trafficking, particularly fentanyl , to the US.
Those threats raised the possibility of countermeasures from Mexico and prompted an emergency visit by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to Trump's Mar a Lago estate on Friday night.
Trump said on this occasion that he had a “very productive“ meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau where they discussed border issues as well as other topics including trade, energy and the Arctic.
„We discussed many important topics that both sides will need to work together to solve, such as the fentanyl and drug crisis that has claimed so many lives, illegal immigration, fair trade deals that do not endanger American workers, and the huge trade deficit that the US has with Canada”, the newly elected American president wrote in another post on his social network.
„Trudeau is committed to working with us to end this terrible devastation of American families,” Trump added.
“Financial Times“ notes that last year alone there were nearly 75,000 deaths in the US that were linked to fentanyl use.
Trump won a landslide election victory earlier this month after campaigning on a campaign promise to impose high tariffs on foreign goods imported into the US, including an additional 60 percent on Chinese goods, and his post-election rhetoric appears to fit those promises.