Joe Biden headed for a photo with G20 leaders on Monday in Rio de Janeiro, his last summit as US president, but it turned out he had already taken the photo without him.
Frustrated US officials blamed “logistical problems” for the blunder that meant Mr Biden missed out on an opportunity to join the prime ministers of Canada and Italy.
It happened during a trip to South America where Biden's counterparts were focused on the outgoing US president and his successor, Donald Trump, from a political perspective.
Biden's swan song on the world stage leaves the 81-year-old looking to shore up his legacy before Trump potentially takes the wrecking ball with his isolationist “America First” foreign policy. There is.
World leaders, including Chinese President Xi Jinping, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and French President Emmanuel Macron, descended on the red-carpeted ramps of Rio's beautiful Bayside Museum of Modern Art and prepared for a group photo. I headed.
They chatted and joked as they gathered to take the stage and pose against the backdrop of the Brazilian city's iconic Sugarloaf Mountain. The snap was over in an instant.
Mr Biden and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau held bilateral talks on the sidelines of the summit and then arrived from different directions, but it was too late and the other leaders had already dispersed.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni also missed the photo. She, Biden and Prime Minister Trudeau formed separate gatherings.
“Due to logistical issues, we took early photos before all the leaders arrived, meaning many leaders were not actually there,” a U.S. official said on condition of anonymity. Ta.
U.S. officials said the official launch of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's Alliance to Curb World Hunger would avoid Biden appearing alongside Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. He denied that he had missed the photo.
Mr Biden had earlier called on G20 leaders to uphold Ukraine's “sovereignty” in the face of a Russian invasion in 2022.
President Vladimir Putin was conspicuously absent from the Rio summit. His arrest is being sought by the International Criminal Court over the Ukraine war.
