Great stuff from Keir Starmer at the G7 Summit this week: first, a clip went viral of him stooping over to pick up a load of papers dropped by Donald Trump, and now, he’s managed to shake hands with the interpreter for South Korea after mistaking him for the actual South Korean President.
Classic:
Keir Starmer mistakenly shakes hands with a Korean interpreter instead of the President of South Korea (2025) pic.twitter.com/OYDjij1aJ1
— insane moments in british politics (@PoliticsMoments) June 18, 2025
Oh dear. Does Keir Starmer think the President of South Korea and his interpreter look the same, or something? Well, I suppose it’s not that big a deal, but unfortunately for Starmer, the press are trying to frame this as a ‘shocking’ and even ‘racist’ gaffe, but it’s really just a mildly amusing incident and probably not as bad as spunking billions in bad PPE contracts to your mates, for example.
Then again, if you add the optics of picking up those papers for Trump, claiming Trump doesn’t want to attack Iran moments before Trump threatens to attack Iran, and then seemingly not recognising one of his global political peers, then you could argue it hasn’t the greatest few days in the office for Sir Keir. Although at least he didn’t ask anyone to ‘free the sausages‘ this time.
What would have been really funny is if the interpreter somehow translated the handshake for the President, Missed opportunity for some comedy there.
