US President Barack Obama laughed away the incident where his furious press secretary Robert Gibbs confronted Indian officials in New Delhi by saying it was for a “good cause” and chuckled that his aide’s foot is “still bruised”.
“It (Gibbs’ confrontation with officials) was for a good cause,” Mr Obama told reporters onboard Air Force One accompanying him his way back to Washington from a 10-day four-nation Asia tour that took him to India, Indonesia, South Korea and Japan. Mr Gibbs put his foot between the doors at New Delhi’s Hyderabad House so that security officials could not close the doors without letting the White House travel pool to enter the room at the start of the meeting between Mr Obama and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh last Monday. “I will say that his foot is still bruised,” Mr Obama said laughingly.
Photographers and cameramen from both India and the US were allowed to enter the room and take pictures for less than a minute.
In photographs splashed across the US media, Mr Gibbs was seen arguing with an Indian official, in which, according to reports, the press secretary wanted to have all the eight White House reporters to enter the conference room, instead of five being insisted upon by the Indian officials. —PTI