🔗 Share this article

This week, Indonesia's leader Prabowo Subianto believed he was a private conversation with US President Donald Trump during Middle East peace talks in Egypt.

Instead, a live microphone situation captured Prabowo requesting Trump to organize a call with his son Don Jr, both of whom serve as executives at the family business.

This was just one in a series of missteps committed by world leaders when they assume no one can hear them.

Below are five other noteworthy errors:

Transplant Procedures and Everlasting Life

During a defense ceremony in Beijing in early autumn, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russia's head Vladimir Putin were recorded discussing organ transplants as a method for prolonging life.

"Human organs can be repeatedly transplanted. The longer you live, the more youthful you get, and you can even achieve immortality," the Russian translator was recorded stating.

Xi, who was not visible, answered in Chinese: "Experts forecast that in the current era humans may reach 150 years old."

Dialogue heard between Chinese president Xi Jinping and Russian leader Vladimir Putin

'Sea Rising at Your Door'

Ex-Australia immigration minister Peter Dutton faced criticism in 2015 when he joked about the plight of residents in the Pacific facing rising sea levels.

Dutton was conversing with then-prime minister Tony Abbott, who had just returned from environmental talks with Pacific Island leaders in Port Moresby.

Observing how a migration discussion was running on "Cape York time", Abbott responded: "There was a similar situation up in Port Moresby."

Dutton commented: "Schedules become irrelevant when you're about to have water lapping at your door."

The comments provoked anger from regional nations and environmentalists, while the political opponents demanded Dutton to apologise.

Peter Dutton overheard joking with Tony Abbott about coastal flooding

'Prejudiced Voter'

As Labour prime minister Gordon Brown was campaigning in 2010, he encountered a voter who questioned him on immigration and the economic situation.

Still wired up to a broadcast microphone when he entered the car, Brown was recorded stating: "That was a disaster – they should not have placed me with that individual. Whose idea was that? Absurd."

Asked what she had said, he answered: "Everything, she was just a bigoted woman."

This incident received extensive coverage for an extended period and Brown went on to lose the political race.

'I Cannot Bear Netanyahu. He's a Liar.'

Former US president Barack Obama was in conversation at the G20 summit in Cannes in 2011 with France's leader Nicolas Sarkozy when their remarks about Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu were captured by a live microphone.

Sarkozy said: "I cannot bear Netanyahu. He's a liar."

Per a account from a translator quoted by Reuters, Obama replied: "You've had enough but I have to deal with him more often than you."

'Major League ***hole'

A vintage recording incident from former White House hopeful George W. Bush occurred when he made a negative comment about a reporter from The New York Times.

The Republican presidential nominee was unaware that a microphone was live when he turned to Dick Cheney at a Labor Day rally and remarked, "That's Adam Clymer, complete jerk from the New York Times."

Cheney responded: "Absolutely, that's true, definitely."

Bush at a Labour rally in 2000