G20 Rome, the dilemma of greeting among leaders

Handshake, fist, hand on heart. The first G20 in attendance after the pandemic immediately presented a real dilemma to the leaders who came to Rome for the summit: how to say hello. A topic of no small importance, given that the top of the greats opened with Mario Draghi doing the honors of the house welcoming and greeting all the ‘colleagues’ upon their arrival at the Eur cloud. In the end the solutions were the most disparate, with a timid return of the handshake without, however, the sunset of the greeting with the fist, one of the ‘gifts’ of the Covid pandemic, was recorded. In front of Draghi, for example, the Indian Modi opted for an energetic ‘shaking hands’, with the two overlapping hands. The same, without hesitation, did other leaders such as Boris Johnson or UN Secretary General Guterres, while Angela Merkel remained faithful to the fist salute. Brazilian President Bolsonaro showed no doubts, choosing the formula of a bow in front of the premier. While Ursula von der Leyen was very warm, who grabbed Draghi’s forearms and opened up in a warm smile. The same format used by Macron.With some hesitation Erdogan presented himself instead, perhaps mindful of the recent long-distance controversy with Draghi after his words on Turkey: the Turkish president first put his hand on his heart and only later did he it is thrown into a handshake. But the greeting, and the body language, is not just form. Indeed, it remains fundamental in all international summits. In particular in this G20 that saw the big names together again after Covid, all ready to seize every precious opportunity to exchange impressions with colleagues beyond the rigid protocol of the summit. Thus the greeting theme was repeated for the various working sessions of the summit. Merkel knows something about it, who to greet Queen Maxima of Holland and have a chat during a break has chosen to give up the mask, while maintaining the greeting with her fist instead of a close hug or handshake. also Boris Johnson, who with Draghi animated a nice curtain just at the resumption of the afternoon session: the British Prime Minister, approached the Prime Minister for an informal face to face, first tried to greet him with a handshake, an attempt that failed. Then he looked for the premier’s knuckles, in vain. And in the end he opted for a friendly punch on the shoulder of Draghi.