Team News Riveting
New Delhi, June 14
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Pope Francis met with a warm embrace at the Outreach session of the G7 Summit in Apulia, southern Italy.
Modi was seen in a light-hearted exchange with the 87-year-old head of the worldwide Catholic Church, who was taken around the table in a wheelchair to greet the world leaders gathered at the summit venue – Borgo Egnazia. The Prime Minister posted photos from the meeting and wrote: “Met Pope Francis on the sidelines of the G7 Summit. I admire his commitment to serve people and make our planet better. Also invited him to visit India.”
The Pope was escorted to the summit by host, accompanied by Italian PM Giorgia Meloni in a wheelchair, and was greeted by several leaders including France’s Emmanuel Macron and European Parliament chief Ursula von der Leyen.
After the Pope visited British PM Rishi Sunak, he was greeted by PM Modi, who promptly shared a light-hearted exchange with the 87-year-old pontiff and held a brief candid conversation with him. The pope will address the session on the promises and perils of Artificial Intelligence and is also expected to make a plea for peace across global conflict zones.
Francis is the first Pope to address G7 leaders on Friday at their annual gathering in southern Italy. He intended to use the occasion to join the chorus of countries and global bodies pushing for stronger guardrails on AI following the boom in generative artificial intelligence kickstarted by OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot.
Modi is expected to hold a bilateral meeting with Pope Francis. Heads of the governments of Algeria, Argentina, Brazil, Jordan, Kenya, and Mauritania – in its capacity as chair of the African Union, Tunisia, Turkiye and the UAE are among the other outreach nations joining India for the session on AI.
