Todd Bishop
The G20 summit was officially unveiled in Osaka, Japan on Friday (28th). When the world’s most powerful leaders gathered together, the public was very concerned about their various interactions, such as who did not appear in the photo, who and who Sit and wait.
On these important international occasions, how do the host countries decide their position when they are in the position of the big photo and the seat at the meeting? In fact, there are some unwritten rules, but of course, if the “enemies” are met according to the rules, some host countries will make small cleverness and subtly change the ranking to avoid “conflict”.
Large photo arrangement: the middle of the host
The most obvious rule for the leaders of the summit when the summit was unveiled was that the host always stood in the center of the eye, and his or her side would be the host of the previous host country and the host of the next session. National leader. For example, this year’s photo, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is in the middle of the first row. On the left is the representative of the next host country, Saudi Arabia, and Mohammed bin Salman. On the right is the president of the last host country, Argentina. Mauricio Macri.
There will be no more than 20 people in the photo, because the G20 summit will also invite the leaders of the guest countries, international organizations such as the World Bank and the leaders of the United Nations, who usually stand in the last third row.
On the seniority?
As for the rest of the station, the New York Post once referred to the “predictive seniority”. The leader who has been in the position for a long time is getting closer to the middle.
However, this is not a rigid rule. The station list is arranged by the organizers. In the end, it may not be a seniority. For example, the “senior” German Chancellor Angela Merkel stood in the front row and was in the front row. The incoming US President, Donald Trump, is in a position closer to the middle.
Bloomberg described the “faded” leader Merkel (will step down in 2021) to be placed next to it, the outgoing British Prime Minister Wen Cuishan was placed in the second row, while Trump stood in Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad and Turkish President In the middle of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, it became the focus.
Seating arrangement: alphabetical order
As for the seating arrangements during the meeting, they are usually in alphabetical order. For example, the photo of the meeting is arranged in alphabetical order according to the name of the country. Therefore, the United States President Trump and the United Kingdom’s Prime Minister Theresa May became a neighbor. But of course, as in the case of the big photo, the host will sit with the leaders of the last host country and the next host country, occupying the middle position when the meeting is taken.
However, in some sensitive times, the host country will consider political factors, and can send small smart changes to the seating chart, because even if it is “alphabet”, it can be divided into English alphabet, Russian alphabet, and Latin alphabet in different order. The political “enemies” are separated.
For example, in 2013, the G20 St. Petersburg Summit, the host country Russia originally intended to arrange the seats of the leaders in Russian order, and eventually changed to English, in order to separate the then American leader Obama and Russia’s Putin.
At the NATO summit in Prague, Czech Republic in 2002, the organizers were accused of deliberately arranging the seating charts in alphabetical order to transfer the then Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma to the farthest position.
