President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he is barring South Africa from participating in the Group of 20 summit next year in Miami and will "stop all payments and subsidies" to the country over its treatment of a US government representative at this year's global meeting.
Trump chose not to have an American delegation attend the recent summit hosted by South Africa, saying he did so because white Afrikaners were being violently persecuted. It is claim that South Africa, which was mired for decades in racial apartheid, has rejected as baseless.
The Republican president, in a social media post, said South Africa had refused to hand over its G20 hosting responsibilities to a senior representative of the US Embassy when the summit ended over the weekend.
"Therefore, at my direction, South Africa will NOT be receiving an invitation to the 2026 G20, which will be hosted in the Great City of Miami, Florida next year," Trump posted on Truth Social.
"South Africa has demonstrated to the World they are not a country worthy of Membership anywhere," he said, "and we are going to stop all payments and subsidies to them, effective immediately."
The summit in Johannesburg, the first held in Africa, was boycotted by the United States, a G20 founding member and the world's biggest economy. The meeting's declaration, giving more attention to issues that affect developing countries, went unsigned by Washington, and the Trump administration expressed its opposition to South Africa's agenda, especially the parts that focus on climate change.
On Monday, the US took over the rotating presidency of the G20, leaving the long-term impact of the South African declaration unclear.
By tradition, the host country hands over a symbolic wooden gavel to the nation taking over the G20 presidency. But there was no American official on hand to receive it from South African President Cyril Ramaphosa because of the boycott.
The US wanted to send a representative from its embassy. South Africa refused, saying it was an insult for Ramaphosa to hand over to what it called a junior official.
Trump has said that the G20 summit in 2026 will be at his golf club in Doral near Miami.
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