Awkward moment as EC chief consigned to sofa at meeting where women’s rights was on agenda
Ursula von der Leyen, the European commission’s first female president, was “surprised” after being left without a chair during a meeting of the EU’s two presidents and Turkey’s leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and has demanded such a snub is never repeated.
The German head of the commission was left visibly irritated at the start of the talks in Ankara with her two male counterparts, Erdoğan and Charles Michel, the former Belgian prime minister who is president of the European council.
“Ehm,” she muttered, with a small gesticulation directed at the occupied seats, as Michel and Erdoğan settled themselves at the head of the gilded room in the presidential complex at the start of the talks.
The awkward scene played out before a three-hour meeting with Erdoğan on Tuesday where one of the issues raised by the EU leaders was women’s rights in light of Turkey’s withdrawal from a convention on gender-based violence.
Michel, who appeared to make a beeline for the top spot next to Erdoğan as the party entered, offered little evidence of regret. Von der Leyen had to make do with a second-rank seat on a sofa opposite Turkey’s foreign minister.
On Wednesday, Von der Leyen’s spokesperson made clear the commission president’s feelings over the issue, noting that the incident had “sharpened her focus” on the issue of equal rights during the discussions that followed.
He said: “The president of the commission was clearly surprised and that is something you can see from the video … The protocol level of our president is exactly the same as that of the president of the European council.
“Our president is a member of the European council in her own right and normally when she goes to foreign countries she was treated in exactly the same way as the president of the European council.
“The president expects that the institution that she represents to be treated with the required protocol and she has therefore asked her team to take all appropriate contacts in order to ensure that such an incident does not occur in the future”. …
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Covid crisis “out of control”, says expert as president Jair Bolsonaro continues to resist lockdown
Brazil’s coronavirus catastrophe has deepened further after more than 4,000 daily deaths were reported for the first time since the outbreak began in February last year.
At least 4,195 people were reported to have lost their lives on Tuesday, taking Brazil’s total death toll - the world’s second highest after the US - to nearly 337,000.
Brazil also reported 86,979 new infections. Experts fear a record 100,000 Brazilians could lose their lives this month alone if nothing is done.
“It’s a nuclear reactor that has set off a chain reaction and is out of control. It’s a biological Fukushima,” said Miguel Nicolelis, a Brazilian doctor and professor at Duke University in the US, who is closely tracking the virus.
Despite the growing crisis, Brazil’s far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, continues to resist the idea of a lockdown and downplay the pandemic.
“There will be no nationwide lockdown,” the president told reporters on Wednesday during a visit to the southern state of Santa Catarina - a bastion of Bolsonaro support. “Our army will not go out on to the streets to keep people in their homes. Freedom is priceless,” added the former army captain who continues to tour the country and mingle with crowds despite the risks to public health.
Brazil, which has 212 million citizens compared with the US’s 328 million, is expected to overtake the US weekly average for daily deaths in the coming days. …
