Yara Aquino Reporter Agência Brasil

Brasília – Because of the earthquake in China yesterday, the president of China, Hu Jintao, decided to move the date of his return ahead by a day. As a result, the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) summit, scheduled for tomorrow, is taking place today, together with the IBSA  (India, Brazil, South Africa) summit, which was originally scheduled for today. Translation: a very busy day in Brasilia.
Celso Amorim, the Foreign Minister, summed it up: “We are doing in one day what we were going to do in two days. We are pleased that Hu Jintao generously did come to Brazil at least for one day.” The program for today began at 8:00 am and will go to 9:30 pm when everyone will sit down to a state dinner that will close out the day and the summits.

Allen Bennett - translator/editor The News in English