Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s statement during a press conference that he called Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “this dictator” caused a diplomatic scandal.
“With these dictators, with whom, however, you need to cooperate, you must be frank in order to confirm your position, but also be ready to cooperate in the interests of your country. We need to find the right balance, ”the European portal Politico quotes the head of the Cabinet.
This is how Draghi reacted to the situation with the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, who was left without a chair during a meeting with Erdogan in Ankara, calling the behavior of the Turkish president “inappropriate.”
Later, Anadolu reported that in this regard, Italian Ambassador to Ankara Massimo Gayani was summoned to the Turkish Foreign Ministry.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs of the republic, Mevlut Cavusoglu, also reacted to Draghi’s statement.
“We strongly condemn the unacceptable populist rhetoric of Italy’s appointed Prime Minister Draghi and his ugly and ruthless statements about our president-elect, and we are returning them to him,” he wrote on his page in Twitter…
Earlier on Thursday, the head of the Turkish Foreign Ministry explained that the visit of von der Leyen and President of the European Council Charles Michel, which raised questions from the European side, was organized taking into account the protocol proposals of the EU. According to him, “this arrangement of chairs was organized in accordance with the proposals of the EU.”
The official meeting of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan with the head of the EC and the President of the European Council was held on April 6 in Ankara. The men occupied two chairs available in the area of the protocol photographing. Von der Leyen had to sit on a sofa to one side, opposite Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, who is of a lower rank according to diplomatic protocol.
This incident has already been criticized by MEPs. MP Sophie in’t Weld in her Twitter account wrote that this was not a coincidence, but was done on purpose.
According to the head of the group of socialists in the European Parliament, Garicia Perez Irace, the incident is related to discrimination against women in Turkey, given Ankara’s recent withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention for the Protection of Women.