G20 Summit 2025 LIVE Updates: Modi holds meeting with Australian PM, event opens under shadow of Trump boycott

PM Modi G20 Summit 2025 LIVE: The G20 Summit will open on Saturday with an ambitious agenda to reach consensus on long-standing problems afflicting the world’s poorest nations. The event is being attended by political leaders from around the world — including Prime Minister Narendra Modi — but US President Donald Trump remains conspicuous in his absence. The famous Soweto township (once home to Nelson Mandela) will play host as they try and find consensus on the priorities set out by the host country.

PM Modi accorded warm welcome in Johannesburg

Prime Minister Narendra Modi was accorded a vibrant and heartfelt welcome by the Indian diaspora upon his arrival in Johannesburg on Friday night. Members of the community also performed folk dances representing 11 Indian states and put up musical performances. The PM also met with the heads of prominent community organisations in the city and held a meeting with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese on the sidelines of the Summit.

“”Both leaders expressed satisfaction at the deepening and diversification of cooperation between India and Australia in the last five years following the elevation of the relationship to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership in 2020. Prime Minister Albanese offered his solidarity on the recent terror attack in India. The leaders committed to strengthening the global fight against terrorism. Both leaders reviewed ways to further deepen bilateral cooperation across a broad spectrum of areas…” said a press release from the Ministry of External Affairs.

Trump boycott shadows event

The two-day summit will take place without the world’s biggest economy after United States President Donald Trump ordered a US boycott of the summit over his claims that South Africa is pursuing racist anti-white policies and persecuting its Afrikaner white minority. A monthslong diplomatic rift between the US and South Africa deepened in the buildup, but while Trump’s boycott dominated the pre-talks talk in Johannesburg and threatened to undercut the agenda, some of the leaders were eager to move on.

“I do regret it. But it should not block us. Our duty is to be present, engage and work all together because we have so many challenges,” said French President Emmanuel Macron.

South Africa said the US was exerting pressure on it not to issue any leaders’ declaration in the absence of the US and instead tone down the final document to a unilateral statement from the host country. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa responded to that by saying “we will not be bullied” and has promised a declaration from all members present at the close of the summit on Sunday. The direction of the G20 bloc is likely to change sharply given the US takes over the rotating presidency from South Africa at the end of this summit and the Trump administration has derided the focus on climate change and inequality.

The only role the US will play at this summit, the White House said, will be when a representative from the United States Embassy in South Africa attends the formal handover ceremony at the end to accept the G20 presidency. South Africa said it’s an insult for Ramaphosa to hand over to what it considers to be a junior diplomatic official.

First African G20 Summit

This is the first time that the G20 Summit is being held in Johannesburg, South Africa and even the African continent. The G20 is actually a group of 21 members that includes 19 nations, the European Union and the African Union. The bloc was formed in 1999 as a bridge between rich and poor nations to confront global financial crises. While it often operates in the shadow of the Group of Seven richest democracies, G20 members together represent around 85% of the world’s economy, 75% of international trade and more than half the global population.

But it works on consensus rather than any binding resolutions, and that is often hard to come by with the different interests of members like the US, Russia, China, India, Japan, the Western European nations France, Germany and the UK, and others like Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and South Africa.