Queen calls Chinese officials 'very rude' in conversation caught on camera
LONDON -- Queen Elizabeth II has been caught in an unguarded moment on camera, describing the behaviour of Chinese officials as "very rude" while president Xi Jinping was on his first state visit to Britain last year.
The comments were made in a conversation with Metropolitan police Commander Lucy D'Orsi during a garden party at Buckingham Palace on Tuesday.
The Queen's official cameraman filmed the police officer describing the Chinese state visit to Britain in October, the Guardian reported.
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D'Orsi complained to the Queen that Xi's visit had been "quite a testing time for me." She claimed Chinese officials "walked out" on both her and the British ambassador telling her "that the trip was off".
"Extraordinary," the Queen replied.
The British monarch then says: "They were very rude to the ambassador."
The conversation is likely to cause embarrassment and irritation at a time when the British government is trying to launch the "golden era" of British-China relations.
Her remarks came shortly after Prime Minister David Cameron described Nigeria and Afghanistan as "fantastically corrupt" in a conversation with the Queen.
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"We've got some leaders of some fantastically corrupt countries coming to Britain... Nigeria and Afghanistan, possibly the two most corrupt countries in the world," he was overheard saying.
Cameron was talking ahead of this week's anti-corruption summit in London.
Nigerian president Muhammadu Buhari, who was elected on an anti-corruption agenda last year, said he was "shocked" by Cameron's statement.
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