WASHINGTON, Nov. 8 — U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday that no U.S. officials will attend G20 summit scheduled to be held in South Africa late this month.
Trump again claimed on his Truth Social platform that Afrikaners, a minority in South Africa, “are being killed and slaughtered, and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated.”
The South African government has repeatedly dismissed the White House allegations throughout the year. “I look forward to hosting the 2026 G20 in Miami, Florida!”, Trump added.
The president had earlier announced that he would not attend the summit in South Africa. Tensions between Washington and Pretoria occurred shortly after Trump returned to office in late January.
Trump signed an executive order to freeze U.S. aid to South Africa in February, accusing the Expropriation Act, a land reform law South African President Cyril Ramaphosa signed in January, of “discriminating” against the country’s white people.
In response, the South African government pushed back against the White House’s accusations, saying the executive order of freezing aid “lacks factual accuracy and fails to recognize South Africa‘s profound and painful history of colonialism and apartheid.”
In February, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on X that he would boycott the G20 summit in Johannesburg because of “bad things” happening in the country, while criticizing the summit for focusing on “solidarity, equality, & sustainability.”
In March, Washington expelled then South African Ambassador Ebrahim Rasool, further straining the bilateral relations. The expulsion followed an earlier address by the South African ambassador, in which he criticized Trump.
In May, Trump confronted visiting South African President Ramaphosa at the White House with conspiracy theories on “white genocide” in South Africa, which Ramaphosa firmly denied.
At the time, Ramaphosa, who had arrived in Washington to improve trade terms and ease bilateral tensions, rejected Trump’s assertions during their meeting.
The South African president refuted the notion that white South Africans are fleeing the country due to racist policies, noting that the majority of crime victims in his country are Black. (Xinhua)
