Lula, Modi take centre stage as BRICS begins without Xi

Unlike Brazil's Group of 20 summit, no one was late or missing when leaders of the world's major emerging-market nations gathered for a family photo Sunday in Rio de Janeiro — at least not accidentally.

- MIRETTE MAGDY & SIMONE IGLESIAS

UNLIKE BRAZIL'S GROUP of 20 summit, no one was late or missing when leaders of the world's major emerging-market nations gathered for a family photo Sunday in Rio de Janeiro — at least not accidentally.

Brazil's Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, hosting the two-day meeting of BRICS countries, took center stage, flanked by South Africa's Cyril Ramaphosa and India's Narendra Modi on either side.

Other representatives from the newly-expanded bloc fanned out from there, with the most controversial international attendees — the foreign ministers of Russia and Iran — on either flank.

It was a sharp contrast from a chaotic family photo against the same backdrop — Rio's iconic Sugarloaf Mountain — in November, when the absence of then-US President Joe Biden, Italy's Giorgia Meloni and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau epitomized the disarray that permeated Brazil's G-20 meetings.

Still, the photo of ten leaders, all of them men, was notable for who wasn't in it: presidents Xi Jinping of China, Russia's Vladimir Putin, Egypt's Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, Iran's Masoud Pezeshkian, and anyone from Saudi Arabia.

Xi, the leader of the bloc's largest and most influential economy, decided against a trip to Rio after visiting Brazil last year and receiving Lula for a state visit in Beijing just a couple months ago.