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exchange with United States president Barack Obama at last week’s G20 summit in Cannes.
The conversation was inadvertently broadcast to journalists.
“I cannot stand him. He’s a liar,” Sarkozy told Obama.
The US president responded by saying: “You’re fed up with him? I have to deal with him every day.”
Neither leader apparently realised that microphones that had been attached for a press conference had already been switched on, allowing journalists waiting for a press conference to hear the conversation.
The exchange was first reported on the French website Arrêt Sur Images, and was later confirmed by a Reuters reporter who also heard the remarks.
Arrêt Sur Images reported that while the two presidents were in private discussions in a closed room before their press conference, Élysée staff handed out translation sets to waiting journalists.
The conversation apparently began with Obama criticising Sarkozy for not warning the US that France would vote in favour of the Palestinians’ application to join Unesco, the United Nations agency for culture and education.
One French journalist told Arrêt Sur Images that the conversation was broadcast for around three minutes before officials realised the mistake.
Another told the website that the reporters agreed not to publicise the remarks because of their sensitive nature.
The exchange was mentioned on a blog by Le Monde’s political correspondent Arnaud Leparmentier, who said the two presidents had discussed their “difficult” relationship with Netanyahu behind closed doors.
Sarkozy is also furious with the British and their premier David Cameron.
According to a Mail Online report, at the weekend, the French president launched an astonishing attack on Britain’s attitude to Europe claiming the British can’t comprehend Europe because they are “an island”.
“You come from an island, so maybe you don’t understand the subtleties of European construction,” he snapped at BBC Newsnight’s economics editor Paul Mason. On October 23 the Sarkozy gave Cameron a nasty dressing down as tensions reached boiling point among European leaders arguing over how to save the euro. Sarkozy was reported to have told Cameron that he should “shut up” during a meeting of the EU’s 27 leaders.
“We are sick of you criticising us and telling us what to do,” he was quoted as saying by EU officials, losing patience at what he perceived to be Cameron’s hectoring from the single currency’s sidelines.
“You say you hate the euro and now you want to interfere in our meetings,” berated Sarkozy. – guardian.co.uk/dailymail.co.uk/The Herald.
Online Reporter