European Women’s Associations have sent a letter to Charles Michel, President of the European Council, demanding his resignation. The corresponding statement was published on the website of the International Charitable Foundation for the Empowerment of Women.
The content of the message is related to the protocol incident in Ankara. This is an incident that occurred during the official meeting of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan with the head of the EC and Michel himself on April 6 in Ankara. Then the men occupied two chairs available in the area of ​​the protocol photographing. At the same time, the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, had to sit on a sofa away from them.
The collection of signatures was announced under the publication. At the moment, more than 3 thousand signatures have been collected in Belgium, France, Italy and even outside the European Union.
The statement lists “three main mistakes” that Michel made during his meeting with Erdogan. According to the representative of the association, the actions of the head of the European Council run counter to the foundations of diplomacy, the European Union and human rights. In addition, the initiators of the petition accused Michel of insulting women.
“Given these three serious mistakes, it is clear that a pathetic apology will not solve the political vacuum that you have created for Europe in relation to its citizens, as well as in relation to the world, most of whose press outlets described this incident, ridiculing it.” , – says the letter to Michel.
The authors of the message asked Michel to resign from the post of President of the European Council.
On the eve, Charles Michel said that he does not sleep well at night because of the situation that happened with the chair for von der Leyen during their visit to Ankara. Michel called the situation shocking and said that he deeply regrets what happened, and if he could go back in time, he would correct the situation.
After the incident with the chair for von der Leyen went public, it was criticized by MEPs. So, the deputy Sophie in’t Weld wrote that this was not a coincidence, but was done on purpose.
In turn, the head of the group of socialists in the European Parliament Garicia Perez Irace expressed the opinion that the incident is related to discrimination against women in Turkey, given Ankara’s recent withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention for the Protection of Women.
French government spokesman Gabriel Attal also called the situation shocking and admitted that the French Foreign Ministry would comment on what happened. For his part, he added that he considers the footage from Ankara primarily sad.