ARKHANGELSK, April 17. /TASS/. Russia's Ministry of Emergency Situations invited BRICS member countries to test their equipment at the Arctic exercises due in Russia in 2025, director of the ministry's international department, Oleg Kuznetsov, told TASS.

"We have called on our partners from other countries to join the Arctic exercises, which will be held in 2025, so that they could test their equipment there," the ministry's representative said. "I refer to our speaker, head of the education and science department, Alexander Bondar, saying if the equipment proves to be working at minus 60 (degrees), it will work in any region of the world. Be that a desert, or regions with high humidity, precipitation, and so on."

The sixth meeting of the BRICS Working Group on Disaster Risk Management is running in Arkhangelsk. The event features 19 representatives from five countries: the UAE, China, India, Ethiopia and Russia. The participants have presented systems to monitor natural emergencies in their countries, and Russia has shared experience of working in the Arctic. Nikolay Korchunov, the Russian Foreign Ministry's Ambassador-at-Large, stressed the competencies of BRICS countries may be of demand in the Arctic, since, for example, South Africa has experience of working in Antarctica, while China and India have experience in the highlands, and Russian technologies can be used in those regions. "The developments, that Russia has in terms of using machinery, and equipment in the Arctic, will be of demand in those countries. We, in fact, would be ready to share these technologies with them," the ministry's international department leader added.

BRICS was organized in 2006. Since then, it has undergone two waves of expansion. In 2011, South Africa joined the organization, which at that time united Brazil, Russia, India and China. In August 2023, six new members were invited to join the association - Argentina, Egypt, Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Ethiopia, but in late December Argentina refused to join BRICS. Since January 1, BRICS features ten member countries.