“Is it OK?” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said during a pause in his opening remarks at the BRICS Summit in New Delhi.
Modi had noticed Chinese President Xi Jinping “looking uncomfortable,” according to local media, and stopped to check on him while aides also appeared to rush to Xi’s side.
It was a brief moment, quickly amplified online as commentators weighed in on the Chinese leader’s health.
“Xi Jinping is not well. This time, China could not hide his condition,” wrote author and prominent China hawk Gordon G. Chang.
Another China critic, Jennifer Zeng, cited a former Chinese Communist Party (CCP) official when she claimed that “Xi Jinping is suffering from cerebellar atrophy”.
“It is a difficult condition to deal with, because unlike problems with some other organs, the cerebellum cannot simply be replaced through a transplant,” Ms Zeng wrote.
“Judging from various signs, it seems quite possible that Xi Jinping is indeed experiencing health problems.”
Xi’s health has long been subject to scrutiny because he has heavily concentrated power around himself without a clear successor, and the health of Chinese leaders is treated as a highly classified state secret.
‘A dying regime’
President Xi’s whirlwind visit to India last week, which lasted just 24 hours, provided critics of his regime with plenty of ammunition.
Xi left the summit early, skipping Modi’s gala dinner while the likes of Russian president Vladimir Putin and South Africa’s president Cyril Ramaphosa stayed on.
“Before the BRICS summit even concluded, Xi Jinping ended his visit to India and returned to Beijing ahead of schedule,” wrote Xie Wanjun, a Chinese political activist who has fled to the United States.
“When boarding the plane, Xi Jinping walked with difficulty, his steps faltering, his body repeatedly leaning to the left,” Mr Xie continued, sharing footage that appeared to show the 71-year-old leader walking up a set of aircraft stairs in an uneventful manner.
Xi left the summit early, skipping the gala dinner hosted by Modi. Picture: Supplied
“All of this suggests that Xi Jinping is already an elderly man, and that his regime is a dying regime.”
Xi’s health aside, the summit hinted at divisions within BRICS.
Founded two decades ago with the aim of reforming the US-led world order, the group has expanded to include Iran, Indonesia, Egypt, Ethiopia and the United Arab Emirates beyond its original membership of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
The joint statement from the summit made no mention of Russia’s war in Ukraine and urged restraint in the war in the Middle East without mentioning the United States by name.
India is not as eager as China or Russia to cast BRICS as an anti-Western bloc and Modi insisted at the summit that the group was “not against anyone”.
An Indian official also poured cold water on speculation about a gold-backed BRICS currency to rival the US dollar, telling reporters: “There is no proposal in the BRICS for a BRICS currency, as of now.”
Xi’s first visit to India in seven years represented a thaw in relations following bloody border clashes in 2020.
But the border dispute remains a sore point, as does India’s massive trade deficit with China.
China launches travel crackdown
For Xi, frictions abroad are mirroring a tightening of control at home.
He returned home as China imposed sweeping travel restrictions on its own citizens this week, including exit bans on anyone deemed to endanger “industrial or technological security”.
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The regulation was drawn up to “safeguard national sovereignty, security and development interests”, according to China’s State Council.
A returning Chinese citizen deemed to have endangered national security abroad could be blocked from leaving China again for six months to three years.