In a gesture resembling old friends meeting, Polish President Andrzej Duda and U.S. President-elect Donald Trump exchanged a handshake and a few words during the official reopening ceremony of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris. The moment was captured in a short video shared online by the Polish Presidential Office.
The event marked the highly anticipated reopening of the iconic cathedral, restored after the devastating 2019 fire. The ceremony began with Archbishop of Paris Laurent Ulrich symbolically knocking three times on the cathedral’s main doors with his crosier, each knock followed by the singing of a psalm. The doors finally opened on the third knock, signaling the start of the grand occasion.
Dignitaries and global leaders gathered for the event, but much of the spotlight was on Trump. During the formal greetings, Trump was seen shaking hands with Duda as one of the first leaders he greeted. While the content of their brief exchange remains undisclosed, the interaction has drawn attention online.