Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf cancels trip to India for BRICS meeting

Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, speaker of the Islamic Consultative Assembly and head of the Islamic Republic's negotiating team with the United States, has cancelled his trip to India to attend the meeting of BRICS parliamentary speakers. The Islamic Republic's embassy in New Delhi said in a statement on Saturday, 24 October 2026, that he would not attend the meeting due to "certain unforeseen circumstances".

The 12th BRICS Parliamentary Forum will be held on Monday and Tuesday, 26 and 27 October, hosted by the Indian parliament in the Central Hall of the parliament building in New Delhi, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is due to meet the heads of the participating delegations. The Islamic Republic's embassy said a parliamentary delegation would attend in Ghalibaf's place, but it gave no explanation of the nature of these "circumstances" and did not name the head of the replacement delegation.

Trip cancelled under the threat of a new attack

The cancellation comes at a time when US officials have reported Donald Trump's inclination to resume military operations against the Islamic Republic, with options ranging from strikes on nuclear facilities to seizing islands on the table. At the same time, the Islamic Republic has sent a message via Pakistan that it would accept reopening the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for lifting the US naval blockade, a file in which Ghalibaf heads the negotiating team.

The embassy's statement made no reference to security considerations. A number of citizen news channels attributed the decision to the speaker's fear of assassination and of a resumption of strikes, a claim that no independent source has confirmed so far.

Ghalibaf at the centre of negotiations and the power struggle

In recent weeks Ghalibaf has become the main face of the Islamic Republic's negotiations, and in a meeting with Asim Munir, Pakistan's army chief, he called the implementation of Tehran's seven conditions a precondition for any agreement. His absence from a meeting that offered a chance to meet officials from India and other BRICS countries comes as the Islamic Republic, under a naval blockade and mounting sanctions, is looking to these countries for support more than ever.

The head of the Islamic Republic's negotiating team stayed away from the BRICS meeting in India at the height of the threat of a new US attack.