France’s Hollande calls Japan ‘China’

TOKYO: France’s Francois Hollande was left red-faced in Tokyo yesterday after a slip of the tongue that saw him confuse his Japanese hosts with the Chinese. During a press conference Hollande, speaking in French, referred to the Algerian hostage crisis in January in which 10 Japanese nationals died, say- ing he had “expressed the condolences of the French people to the Chinese people.” The president, who is in Japan on a three-day state visit, made no attempt to correct his mistake.
A quick-thinking female interpreter fixed the verbal gaffe as she gave her simultane- ous translation, rendering the sentence as it had been intended. However, at least one Japanese journalist with knowledge of French picked up on the error.