During the tripartite summit organized in Tehran, the Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan made Vladimir Putin wait in front of the cameras for forty-five seconds. A gesture that speaks volumes and of which the Russian president is usually customary.
In politics, words, gestures have a meaning… And forty-five seconds of waiting, when you are the president of one of the great world powers, it’s a long time. Vladimir Putin knows this well and he struggled to hide his discomfort in front of cameras and cameras.
The Russian president remained standing, in front of his armchair and the Russian flag, his hands crossed on his stomach. Embarrassed as the seconds passed, he started shifting his weight from one foot to the other…then making faces.
The meaning of these few tens of seconds of waiting, Vladimir Putin knows them all the better as it is a practice to which he himself has often resorted.
Putin, no longer in a position of strength
Facing Recep Tayyip Erdogan during a meeting in Moscow in 2020: the Turkish president had, at the time, had to wait several minutes. Because Vladimir Putin’s delays can be long: he kept the Queen of England waiting for 13 minutes, Donald Trump for 45 and Pope Francis for an hour.
But that he is now the patient, shows that he is no longer in a strong position. The Russian president is certainly left Tehran with visible support from Iranian leaders, showing that it is not totally isolated on the international scene. But Iran is also a country under Western sanctions. And by making him wait, Recep Tayyip Erdogan told him that the support of a country integrated into the concert of Nations had a cost.