THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Michelle Obama has brushed off a row with an Indonesian minister who was reluctant to shake her hand.
America's First Lady visited southeast Asia's biggest mosque with her husband on Wednesday, a day after Indonesia's communications minister had told Twitter followers that he had reluctantly shaken hands with her at a formal reception.
Tifatul Sembiring, a conservative Muslim who refuses to touch women he is not related to tweeted: "I tried to prevent it with my two hands but Mrs Michelle moved her hands too close to me, then we touched."
Video footage of the meeting suggested otherwise, however, showing Mr Sembiring reaching out to shake Michelle's hand like the other dignitaries.The Obamas much-anticipated visit to the Istiqlal Mosque in central Jakarta was one of the last stops on Mr Obama's twice-postponed visit to Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim-majority country.
Grand Imam Haji Mustafa Ali Yaqub showed the Obamas around the massive domed structure, which was still being built when a young Mr Obama lived in the nearby suburb of Menteng as a child in the late 1960s. >>> | Wednesday, November 19, 2010
Flashback: Indonesian Mosque Obama Visited Greeted Ahmadinejad as a “Rock Star” Where He Called For The Destruction of Israel, Predicted Sharia Would Rule World >>>
HT: Pastorius of iBloga >>> Pastorius | Wednesday, November 10, 2010
