AI-Generated Image Viral as Real Photo of World Leaders at 2026 BRICS Summit

The image is an AI-generated one and doesn't show real visuals of world leaders at the 2026 BRICS Summit in India.

An AI-generated image has gone viral on social media with the false claim that it shows a real selfie of world leaders at the 2026 BRICS Summit.

(Source: X/Altered by The Quint)

A selfie, showing Russian President Vladimir Putin, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the President of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, and Iran's Ebrahim Raisi, has gone viral on social media.

The claim: Those sharing this image have claimed that it shows a selfie taken during the 2026 BRICS Summit, which is being held at the Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi on 12 and 13 September.

• News organisation Asianet Hindi also shared this image as one from the BRICS Summit in their report.

An archived version of this report can be seen here.

(Source: Asianet Hindi/Screenshot)

(Archives of more posts sharing this image can be seen here, here, and here.)

But...?: The image is an AI-generated one and does not show a real image of world leaders at the 2026 BRICS Summit.

How did we find out the truth?: There are some glaring errors in the viral image.

• The Brazilian president and the UAE's president are not in attendance at the 2026 BRICS Summit, along with the Turkish president.

• Instead, Brazil is being represented by Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira, while Crown Prince Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan is representing the UAE.

• The biggest error in the image is the presence of former Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, because Raisi died in a helicopter crash in May 2024.

Because of these errors in the image, we ran it through AI-generated content detectors.

Is it AI?: While Hive Moderation gave the image a 99.9 percent likelihood of being an AI-generated one, Sightengine's tool gave the image a 99 percent score for the same.

(Source: Hive Moderation/Screenshot)

(Source: Sightengine/Screenshot)

• Since both tools noted that the image was possibly made using ChatGPT, we ran it through OpenAI's Verify.

• Verify noted that the image was generated using OpenAI's tools.

(Source: Verify/Screenshot)

Authentic visuals of leaders at the Summit were shared by PM Modi's and the Ministry of External Affairs' official accounts and can be seen here. (Swipe).

PM Modi shared this photo on his X account.

(Source: X)

Conclusion: An AI-generated image has gone viral on social media with the false claim that it shows a real selfie of world leaders at the 2026 BRICS Summit.

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