The Ministry of External Affairs of India condemned “malicious post son social media” on Thursday, responding to rumors circulating on Twitter that genocidal Chinese dictator Xi Jinping and ally President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa had fallen ill after dining at the Indian-hosted BRICS summit this weekend.
The Indian government did not elaborate on what parts of the rumors were malicious or false, notable as the government of South Africa did confirm on Wednesday that Ramaphosa was experiencing an unspecified illness and could be canceling his public engagements to properly recover.
New Delhi hosted the annual BRICS Summit on September 12 and 13, welcoming the heads of state of member nations. BRICS is a security and economic bloc created as a counterweight to the American-led world order and largely considered to be led by China. Its name acronym refers to its initial members – Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa – but it has since welcomed as full members Egypt, Iran, Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Indonesia. BRICS also created a second-tier “partner” status that includes a host of rogue states, including Cuba and Belarus, that appears to be a model the European Union is now interested in emulating.
The summit was marred by the various divisions among BRICS members, particularly the active hostilities between Iran and the UAE and conflicting interests among Russia, China, and India. Days after the summit, however, rumors began swirling online that the dinner for world leaders in New Delhi had adversely affected some of its most high-profile attendees.
The most widely spreading rumors appears to be that Xi Jinping suffered significant illness as a result of his participation in the BRICS summit. Anti-communist opposition leader Wanjun Xie, of the China Democratic Party, wrote on Twitter that Xi allegedly fainted during the summit, suffered a stroke, and was still in sensitive condition as of Wednesday.
Xie claimed that “a military helicopter was used to transport Xi Jinping directly to Beijing’s 301 [military] Hospital for emergency treatment,” where he was diagnosed with a “severe ischemic stroke.” Despite Xi’s allegedly dire mental condition, Xie also claimed that Xi had been conscious enough to reject any medical care while in India. He provided no evidence for these claims.
Chinese opposition groups have for years regularly claimed that Xi Jinping has suffered a stroke. Xi has emerged in the public eye subsequently after multiple rounds of these rumors and not appeared to be in ill health. Xi’s health, however, is considered a closely guarded state secret, making it impossible for observers to confirm one way or another whether he has ever suffered a stroke.
The Xi Jinping stroke rumors were coupled on Wednesday with a video from the opening of the BRICS summit this weekend in which Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi interrupted his remarks to check on Xi, turning to his seat and asking, “is it ok?”
The Chinese dissident account “Mr. Li Is Not Your Teacher” observed on Thursday, however, that Russian state media aired the full clip of the exchange during the summit, which shows Xi fiddling with an earpiece. The Russian report claimed that Xi appeared to have trouble with his simultaneous translation device and Modi stopped speaking to ensure the Chinese leader could understanding him before he delivered his remarks.
The Chinese Communist Party has not addressed any rumors about Xi Jinping’s health at press time. The Chinese Foreign Ministry confirmed on September 13 that Xi returned to Beijing after a “successful” attendance at the BRICS summit without incident.
Independent of the Xi Jinping rumor mill, the government of South Africa appeared to accelerate speculation about the aftermath of the BRICS summit on Wednesday after confirming that President Ramaphosa would require recovery time after unspecified illness. The statement from Ramaphosa’s office explicitly mentioned his long travel to the BRICS summit.
“The Presidency wishes to advise that, due to ill health, President Cyril Ramaphosa is currently booked off from public engagements,” the office announced. “President Ramaphosa, who returned from the BRICS Summit in India on Monday, has been advised by his medical team to rest and recover. Where possible, the President has asked the respective Ministers to represent him at scheduled public engagements.”
The combination of the Ramaphosa news and the Xi rumors prompted the Indian Foreign Ministry to finally weigh in, publishing various screencaps of social media messages and dismissing them as “misleading” at best.
“We caution against such malicious posts on social media platforms!” the Foreign Ministry’s fact-check account declared.
The BRICS summit concluded without any meaningful incident on Sunday. Its joint statement from the parties involved raised eyebrows, however, for its vague themes and refusal to address major crises directly. The extensive joint statement did not mention the Iran-U.S. conflict directly, for example, instead suggesting that would countries should join forces to ensure peace in the Middle East. The document also did not mention the United States directly, despite common knowledge that the objective of BRICS is to limit American economic and diplomatic authority, and spoke extensively of AI, but without concrete proposals for cooperation. Following the summit, the Chinese state-run Global Times newspaper published a column that dismissed the possibility of cooperation with India on AI because of a lack of “political trust.”