BRUSSELS (AP) – Gender equality issues took center stage in Brussels on Wednesday, a day after Ursula von der Leyen, one of the EU’s most powerful executives, was treated as a second-rate official during a visit to Ankara.
Von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, and the head of the European Council, Charles Michel, visited Turkey on Tuesday to talk with Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan, which focuses on EU-Turkey relations. After being led to a large room for discussions with Erdogan, television footage showed that only two chairs had been arranged in front of the EU and Turkish flags for the three leaders.
Michel and Erdogan occupied the chairs while von der Leyen stared at the two men, expressing his astonishment with a “ehm” and a gesture of disappointment. Von der Leyen finally sat down on a large beige sofa, away from his male counterparts.
According to an EU source, the meeting between the three leaders lasted more than two and a half hours.
“The important thing is that the president should have been seated in exactly the same way as the president of the European council and the Turkish president,” said EU Commission chief spokesman Eric Mamer, who added that Von der Leyen was surprised by the agreements.
“He decided, however, to prioritize the substance over the protocol, but he allowed me to stress that the president expects the institution he represents to be treated with the required protocol and has therefore asked his team to take all proper contacts to make sure this incident doesn’t happen in the future, ”Mamer said.
She added that Von der Leyen’s protocol team did not travel to Turkey with her due to the coronavirus pandemic.
There were no immediate comments from the Turkish presidency or the European Council.
The diplomatic incident was widely reported on social media. European lawmaker Sophie in ‘t Veld posted pictures of previous meetings between Michel and Von der Leyen’s predecessors with Erdogan, with the trio of men sitting in chairs next to each other.
“And no, it wasn’t a coincidence, it was deliberate,” a ‘t Veld wrote on Twitter, wondering why Michel remained “silent.”
“” Ehm “is the new term for” it’s not how the EU-Turkey relationship should be, “said Sergey Lagodinsky, another member of the European Parliament, who uses the hashtags #GiveHerASeat and #womensrights.
Last month, Erdogan withdrew Turkey from a key European convention to combat violence against women, sparking criticism from EU officials. The move was a blow to Turkey’s women’s rights movement, which says domestic violence and murders of women are on the rise.
Von der Leyen called on Erdogan to reverse his decision to withdraw from the Istanbul Convention.
“Human rights issues are not negotiable. We were very clear about that. We urge Turkey to reverse its decision because it is the first binding international instrument to combat violence against women and children, ”she said.
Asked if the commission considered the incident specifically gender-related, Mamer said Von der Leyen traveled to Ankara as president of an EU institution.
“Being male or female doesn’t change anything because she should have been seated according to the same protocols as the other two participants,” Mamer said. “She took the opportunity to specifically address the Istanbul convention and women’s rights. I think the message sent was clear.”
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Suzan Fraser in Ankara and Raf Casert in Brussels contributed to this story.