FOR BETTER or worse, it is often hard to ignore Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi. When US president Barack Obama addressed a crowd of 20,000 in Prague yesterday, prior to a meeting with EU leaders in the Czech capital, he may just have noticed an improvised banner in the crowd, reading “Sorry 4 Berlusconi”.
The US president did, of course, have an important speech to make, one in which he outlined his vision of a world free of nuclear weapons, and in which he also condemned North Korea’s “provocative” rocket launch earlier in the day.
However, the banner in question concerned a somewhat less serious issue, namely the flamboyant Mr Berlusconi’s continuing ability to flout diplomatic convention and protocol with a series of gaffes over the recent days of G20 and Nato meetings.
On Wednesday, Mr Berlusconi managed to startle Queen Elizabeth at the end of a group photo in Buckingham Palace, on the eve of Thursday’s G20 summit.
Mr Berlusconi shouted across to the US president, “Hey, Mister Obama”, prompting the queen to look around and complain, “Why does he have to shout?”
On Saturday, Mr Berlusconi did it again, this time keeping German chancellor Angela Merkel and the other Nato leaders, including Mr Obama, waiting on the German banks of the Rhine prior to a historic and symbolic ceremony marking Nato’s 60th anniversary.
When Mr Berlusconi’s car pulled up on the river bank, Dr Merkel was there on the red carpet waiting to greet him.
However, the Italian prime minister got out of the car with his mobile phone at his ear, pausing to signal to the chancellor that he was busy and seeming to indicate that he would join her and the other leaders later.
Shortly afterwards, when British prime minister Gordon Brown arrived, he and Dr Merkel seemed to be much amused by the spectacle of Berlusconi walking up and down on the riverside in animated conversation.
In the end, Mr Berlusconi’s phone conversation went on too long, with Dr Merkel deciding not to wait any longer for him and going ahead without him on a symbolic walk across a footbridge over the Rhine on which the leaders were met by French president Nicolas Sarkozy, who was coming from the French side of the river.
Mr Berlusconi followed on later, in the meantime having missed out on another group photograph and a minute’s silence to mark the Nato victims of the last 60 years.
Annoyed with criticism in Italy over the incident, an indignant Mr Berlusconi later explained that he had been on the phone to Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, persuading him to accept the appointment of Danish prime minister Anders Rasmussen as the new Nato secretary general.
“It matters little, it seems, that according to both the Americans and the Turks, the agreement on the choice of Rasmussen came about after two meetings, one on Friday night in Baden-Baden and the other on Saturday morning in Strasbourg, between Obama and Turkish president [Abdullah] Gül” commented Italian daily newspaper La Repubblica yesterday.