Russian president Vladimir Putin has been left awkwardly standing in a room in front of a throng of reporters while waiting to meet Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Footage taken ahead of the meeting on Tuesday shows Mr Putin fidgeting, shifting his weight and pulling a series of uncomfortable faces in front of cameras for nearly a minute before he is finally greeted by Mr Erdogan.
It was unfamiliar terrain for the Russian leader who has developed a reputation for keeping world leaders waiting, on purpose, sometimes for hours after scheduled talks were due to begin. Some speculated it may have been payback for a 2020 meeting in Moscow that saw Mr Erdogan wait so long to enter the meeting room that he took a seat.
Reporters captured the moment Putin strode into the room on Tuesday in the expectation Mr Erdogan would swiftly follow suit. Instead, he was left standing amid the sound of camera shutters.
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With his hands clasped in front of him, the usually stoic Russian leader was seen shuffling his feet and sucking his cheeks during the 50-second wait. Finally, Mr Putin let his hands fall by his sides with a hint of exasperation as Mr Erdogan casually emerged and the pair shook hands.
In 2020, Turkish media reported Mr Erdogan and his entourage were left humiliated after they were forced to wait outside in an antechamber in footage shared widely by Russian news outlets.
Mr Erdogan has been leading efforts to broker a deal to allow thousands of tonnes of grain that is being blockaded by Russia to leave Ukraine’s ports.
Turkey, a Nato member, has a special responsibility under the 1936 Montreux convention for naval traffic entering the Black Sea. It is proposing that Russia allow Ukrainian grain ships to leave Odesa on designated routes so long as checks are made that the vessels are not carrying arms.
Some have speculated that Mr Putin’s tardiness when meeting with international leaders is a calibrated psychological policy that goes back to the early days of his presidency.
According to Radio Free Europe, former German leader Angela Merkel was left waiting for four hours and 15 minutes for a meeting with Mr Putin in 2014, while Viktor Yanukovych, when he was Ukrainian president, once waited four hours before sitting down with the Russian leader. — Guardian