For days, the "SofaGate" affair has been increasingly heating up tempers - now the missing third chair during the latest visit of EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to Ankara is leading to diplomatic tensions between Italy and Turkey. Prime Minister Mario Draghi accused Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of humiliating von der Leyen when he himself and EU Council President Charles Michel took their seats on two side-by-side armchairs and the Commission President had to sit on a sofa at a considerable distance. Erdoğan's behavior was inappropriate, Draghi said at a press conference in Rome on Thursday evening.

Let's call a spade a spade, the dictators

"This was behavior that I disliked very much because of the humiliation suffered by the president of the EU Commission, von der Leyen," said the former head of the European Central Bank (ECB). With "these, let's call them by name - dictators," one must speak a clear language and express the differences in ideas about society,” he said. But one must also be prepared to cooperate with them in the interest of the country, Draghi said. The right balance is needed, he said.

Great disgruntlement in Ankara

In Ankara, Draghi's remarks triggered the usual reactions. The Turkish Foreign Ministry immediately summoned Italy's ambassador. Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, who was at the EU-Turkey meeting, called Draghi's comments "ugly and unreasonable." On Twitter, the minister wrote: "We strongly condemn these unacceptable, populist remarks (...)." Çavuşoğlu had previously said that the arrangement of the seats had met the EU's demands. He said his country was therefore facing "unjust accusations."

Reproach: misogyny

The EU Commission had expressed outrage at the seating arrangements at the EU-Turkey meeting in Ankara. A spokesman made it clear that Commission President Ursula von der Leyen should have been seated at eye level with EU Council President Charles Michel and Erdoğan. "The president was clearly surprised," he said. Among European politicians, von der Leyen's banishment to an offside sofa sparked accusations of misogyny directed at the Turkish government. The scene was seen in a video. Conservatives and Social Democrats as the largest groups in the European Parliament demand clarification of the incident and demand a plenary session with von der Leyen and Michel.