The group comprised of Gursharan Kaur, wife of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Sarah Brown, the wife of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Margarita Calderon, wife of Mexican President Felipe Calderon, and Filippa Reinfeldt, wife of Swedish Prime Minister Frederik Reinfeldt and Nompumelelo Ntuli Zuma, wife of South African President Jacob Zuma, were also at the audience along with Margarida Barroso, wife of European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso.

Image: The Pope walks past the First Ladies

US First Lady Michelle Obama was also not part of the meeting with the Pope as she is expected to have a separate audience with the Pope on Friday alongside her husband and US President Barack Obama. 
Image: First Ladies visiting the Vatican gardens following the Pope's hearing

According to the Scotsman, the group was given a tour of the Vatican by Mara Carfagna, a 33-year-old former nude model and Miss Italia contestant, handpicked by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to become his equalities minister. 

Carfagna was only drafted in because the woman who should have acted as First Hostess, Berlusconi's wife Veronica Lario, is currently divorcing the prime minister over his friendship with an 18-year-old aspiring model, the report added.
Image: The group at the Saint Peter's Basilica
Photographs: Osservatore Romano/Reuters