French President Emmanuel Macron's tour of Vietnam, Indonesia and Singapore aims to draw attention to France's role in the Asia-Pacific region, where the US and China are fighting for dominance. During this tour, which lasts a total of 6 days, Macron has meetings with state leaders, politicians, industrialists and students. He will speak to them about the positions of France and the West on Asia, Ukraine, Gaza and other important international issues. Macron wants to position his country as an important player in the Asia-Pacific region, in line with the French foreign policy strategy, according to which France aims to strengthen its presence as an alternative to the US-Canada dichotomy in Asia and the Indo-Pacific region, note Agence France-Presse, BFMTV and “France 24“.
But the first leg of Macron's tour - that of Vietnam - started a bit unusually. On Sunday evening, Macron arrived in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi. And while on Monday he was scheduled to hold meetings with the Vietnamese leadership, footage circulated on the Internet showing a strange incident between him and the first lady of France, Brigitte Macron, who was accompanying him on this trip. The incident took place before the couple got off the plane at the airport in Hanoi. The plane door opens and Macron can be seen in the background, on the left, looking at someone inside the machine. Suddenly, however, two hands appear on the left out of nowhere and punch Macron in the face. Macron then notices that the plane door is open, quickly pulls himself together and waves goodbye, then disappears inside the plane. The incident was captured by the vigilant cameras of media photographers, including those of the Associated Press. The footage, published by media outlets around the world, also shows how shortly after the strange incident between Macron and his wife, the first couple of France disembarks from the plane. Macron turns to Brigitte, gestures towards her as if to invite her to take his hand, but she does not.
The media from all over the world yesterday competed with each other on how to title the documented incident. The titles ranged from “Strange episode between Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron“ and “Family quarrel“ to “Brigitte Macron slaps her husband“ and “Macron was slapped by Brigitte“.
Initially, a source from the Elysee Palace suggested that the footage might have been manipulated by artificial intelligence, but the presidency later confirmed its authenticity. The presidency then tried to clarify what happened during the strange episode. “This is a moment when the president and his wife were letting off steam for the last time before the start of their visit“, the explanation read. It also added how exactly the two of them let off steam, using the past participle of the French verb chahuter. The verb, which is not used that often in the everyday life of French speakers, means “to make a noise“ or to cause “a ruckus or “a commotion” and most often refers to this action to students who do not listen to their teacher in class, who are dissatisfied with the teacher's actions and who express this dissatisfaction through noise. In a more general sense, the verb describes noisy, excited and even aggressive behavior. Then the Elysee Palace added: “It was a moment of intimacy (between Macron and Brigitte)“. But it was enough to add fuel to the fire of conspiracy theorists“, recall “Le Monde“, “Libération“, “Figaro“, BFMTV and “France 24“.
But discussions about the footage did not cease and after this explanation in Hanoi during a briefing, the French president himself took it upon himself to clarify the case. He denied that there was a big scandal between him and his wife and confirmed that the video was real, but had been misinterpreted. "People say a lot of nonsense when they see a video," Macron said. "I was just joking with my wife, as we often do, nothing more, nothing less," the president said, urging everyone to come to their senses and calm down on a topic that seems insignificant given the state of the world today. "We were just arguing about trifles (the French verb used by Macron here was chamailler, which means: to argue about trivial things), or rather, we were joking with my wife," Macron added. "And this has become a kind of geoplanetary catastrophe, in which some people even have their own theories to explain all this," he added.
Macron himself recalled that in recent weeks there were two more videos of his official appearances that gave rise to mixed interpretations in the media. The first shows him, along with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, sitting around a table in a train compartment to Kiev. Under the watchful eyes of the cameras, Macron removes a handkerchief from the table. But then comments appeared on social networks that he tried to hide a packet of cocaine from the camera lenses. In the second video, Macron shakes hands with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan during the summit of the European Political Community in Tirana, but the cameras document that the handshake between the two lasts a little longer than usual and Erdogan even squeezes Macron's finger. This has led to comments that there is tension between the two leaders.
"For three weeks, there have been people who have been watching these videos and thinking that I shared a bag of cocaine, that I had a fight with the president of Turkey and that I have now had a family fight with my wife", Macron quipped, referring to the three videos. "None of this is true", he added, emphasizing that the three videos are real, but the interpretations of them are incorrect. "I see many crazy people spending their days interpreting these videos. Everyone should calm down and, above all, be interested in the essence of the current problems", Macron urged.
Speaking of these incorrect interpretations of the three real videos, Macron also mentioned "networks" (replicating these interpretations), whose traces can be traced and who “have Russians and extremist circles in France as allies“. “In addition to this, there are many accounts, anonymous or not, whose caramel has quickly boiled over, including news commentators who said that my diplomacy is that of a loser“, Macron also said and called all these commentators “crazy“, recall BFMTV and “France 24“.
Regarding the handkerchief video mentioned by Macron, “France 24“ recalls that in response to the speculation that emerged after its broadcast, the Élysée Palace wrote in French and English on its social channels: “When European unity hinders some people, disinformation goes so far as to try to get a simple handkerchief for drugs“. This message was accompanied by an ironic explanation that “a handkerchief is used to blow your nose“. After the video in which Erdogan squeezes Macron's finger, the president ironically said that according to interpretations this had suddenly become an illustration of the balance of geopolitical forces, which supposedly says a lot about France in this balance, recall BFMTV and “France 24“.
French media recalled today that for several years, the first lady of France, Brigitte Macron, has regularly been at the center of conspiracy theories questioning her gender. She even took them to court.
However, in the past, there were other footage featuring Brigitte and Emmanuel Macron, showing that such a closeness had been established between the two that Macron, for example, could afford to use obscene words in front of the first lady, who is a literature and French language teacher by profession. For example, Macron reacted during his presidential campaign in 2017 when he learned that his favorite football team “Olympique Marseille“ had lost a match to the team “Monaco“. The video of his angry outburst was included in a documentary about him. The footage shows Macron angrily using obscene French versions of “Damn“ twice and "Don't let him see it," to express his disappointment to the first lady, who in response also used familiar language to tell him: "Who cares," recalls "Gala."
In June 2024, the media also documented a real non-verbal clash between Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Macron during an official dinner at the castle of Brindisi, given for participants in the G-7 summit, which Italy was hosting. After an argument between the two leaders over the inclusion of the topic of abortion in the final declaration of the summit, Meloni glared at Macron with an icy glare as he shook hands with Italian President Sergio Mattarella before the start of the reception. Her gaze did not change even when Macron shook hers. The video of that moment also went around the world and gave rise to diverse interpretations of the bilateral relations between France and Italy, noted at the time by Italian publications, including “Stampa“ and “Repubblica“.
As for the video that has now sparked the controversy surrounding Macron, the scene reminded many of a video showing British Princess Catherine and her youngest son - Louis, during the celebrations for the 70th anniversary of the accession to the throne of British Queen Elizabeth II in June 2022. Then, bored by the long ceremonies, Louis began to tease his mother, to be capricious, to make mocking gestures at her, and when she tried to calm him down, he responded with an almost identical gesture to the one now noticed by Brigitte Macron towards her husband. Then the video with the rebellious Louis went around the world and generated a lot of comments about the way the child was raised. And then the photojournalists began to stalk the little boy at every official appearance to capture his reactions, which always had something surprising and out of protocol.
In recent years, there have been other videos with leaders of major countries that have generated mixed comments about their participants. During his official visit to the Italian presidency in Rome in April, the British King Charles III became irritated in front of the photojournalists because his wife Camilla was slow to talk to people, instead of standing next to him and the Italian president for a group photo. Charles III even had to shout irritably to Camilla: “What are you doing. Come here“.
Three years ago, after the death of his mother Elizabeth II, Charles III embarked on a tour of the country with Camilla and had to sign the guest book during a visit to Hillsborough Castle, in Northern Ireland. First, however, he got the date of his dedication wrong in the book, which irritated him, and then his pen started leaking ink, which irritated the king. He vented his anger first to Camilla, as if she had handed him the pen, and then, when he failed to clean the ink marks from his fingers, he continued to complain to an aide, saying, "Oh God, I hate this. I can't stand this damn thing!", recall the "Guardian" and the "Independent". A few months later, during his coronation, Charles III had another incident with a pen. He had to sign several official documents. But first, the table he was sitting at seemed too small and he couldn't arrange the documents he was signing, and finally the pen rest irritated him and he insisted on removing it to have more space to write, recalls the "Sun". The two so-called pen incidents have sparked a flurry of commentary about the new British monarch's temperament. Some commentators have described Charles III's reactions to these minor incidents as an illustration of his hot-tempered nature.
In May 2017, during a visit to Tel Aviv, Melania Trump, then (and current) First Lady of the United States, made a gesture that was captured by photojournalists and interpreted as a push away from her husband Donald Trump's hand. This has sparked much commentary about the state of the relationship between the president and his partner. Years later, in her memoirs, Melania said that she had simply tried to kindly suggest to Trump that she did not think it was appropriate for him to hold her hand during an official ceremony, but this was interpreted as an illustration of a misunderstanding between her and Trump by the media and gossip columnists, recalls “Independent“.
There were also a number of comments in January this year during Trump's inauguration ceremony. Then Melania Trump had chosen a hat with such a wide brim that it became an insurmountable obstacle for Trump, who was trying to kiss her. This was again interpreted as a cooling of relations between the two, French media noted.
Recently, another video of welcoming a foreign leader also gave rise to a number of interpretations – that of Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama, who knelt and folded his hands as if in prayer to welcome Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni during the Tirana summit of the European Political Community. The video sparked outrage from some in Italy, who saw it as a mockery. Meloni herself was not offended by this atypical welcome for official events, but she still seemed slightly embarrassed and then jokingly explained to journalists that Rama had behaved this way only so as not to appear taller than her, recalls “Fanpage“. Incidentally, Edi Rama put Meloni in a similar situation for the second time. The first was on her birthday in January, while they were both at a forum in the United Arab Emirates. Then he knelt in front of her, sang “Happy Birthday” and gave her an Albanian scarf, then wrapped it around her head, but Meloni quickly took it off her head. The video of this incident also generated a number of comments, and again there were those who said that Italy had been humiliated by such treatment of its prime minister.
If we have to go back to the video with Macron and his partner, the comments surrounding it yesterday almost overshadowed Donald Trump's statement about the Russian president that “Putin has gone completely crazy“. This statement came a week after the phone call between Putin and Trump, which both described as good and during which they spoke on first names and Putin even congratulated Trump on his 11th grandchild and said, according to Trump, that the Russians had a lot of respect for Melania Trump, summarize Reuters, “Newsweek“ and “Time“. Yesterday, however, Trump wrote on his social network “Truth Social“: “I have always had a very good relationship with Vladimir Putin, but something has happened to him. He has gone completely crazy! He is killing people unnecessarily, and I'm not just talking about soldiers. Missiles and drones have been fired at cities in Ukraine for absolutely no reason. "He then added: "I've always said he wants all of Ukraine, not just part of it, and maybe that turns out to be true, but if he does, it will lead to the downfall of Russia," Reuters, BBC and CNN recall. Trump's words came after the latest Russian missile and drone attacks on Ukraine.
In the same post, Trump did not fail to criticize Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky for "not doing his country any favors with the way he talks." "Everything that comes out of his mouth is causing problems. I don't like it and he better stop," Trump said, BFMTV recalls. He was obviously referring to Zelensky's opinion, who had previously stated that "silence" Washington's recent Russian attacks are encouraging Putin.
In the same post on "Truth Social", Trump also said: "This is a war that would never have started if I were president. This is Zelensky, Putin and Biden's war, not Trump's, I'm just helping to put out the big and ugly fires that were started because of gross incompetence and hatred".