Paris: They were just play fighting.
That was French President Emmanuel Macron’s explanation for video images that showed show his wife, Brigitte, pushing her husband away with both hands on his face before they disembarked from their plane to start a tour of South-East Asia this weekend.
The moment quickly made headlines in France, with media trying to decipher the interaction that cameras spotted through the just-opened door of the plane. The headline of a story on the website of the daily Le Parisien newspaper asked: “Slap or ‘squabble’? The images of Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron disembarking in Vietnam trigger a lot of comments.
Macron later told reporters that the couple – married since 2007 after meeting at the high school where he was a student and she was a teacher – were simply joking around.
“We are squabbling and, rather, joking with my wife,” he said, adding that the incident was being overblown into “a sort of geo-planetary catastrophe.”
In video taken by The Associated Press as the Macrons arrived in Hanoi, Vietnam, on Sunday, a uniformed man can be seen pulling open the plane door and revealing the president standing inside, dressed in a suit and talking to someone who wasn’t visible.
In this grab taken from video, France’s President Emmanuel Macron’s appears to push his face away as they prepare to disembark a plane.Credit: AP
Brigitte Macron’s arms – in red – were seen reaching out and pushing Macron away, with one hand covering his mouth and part of his nose while the other was on his jaw. The French leader recoiled, turning his head away. Then, apparently realising that he was on camera, he broke into a smile and gave a little wave.
In subsequent images, Macron and his wife, wearing a red jacket, appeared at the top of the stairs. He offered an arm but she didn’t take it. They walked down the carpeted stairs side by side.
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- Source of information and images “brisbanetimes”“
