Japan PM's wife 'pretended not to know English' with Trump

In an interview with New York Times journalist Maggie Haberman last week, President Donald Trump bemoaned the difficulties of sitting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's wife Akie at a dinner during the G20 summit.

"She's a terrific woman, but doesn't speak English," Trump said, adding: "Like, not 'hello'."

"That must make for awkward seating" Haberman said, to which the President replied that it was "hard" to sit alongside the apparently non-English speaking Abe for an hour and 45 minutes.

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"But I enjoyed the evening with her, and she’s really a lovely woman, and I enjoyed… the whole thing was good," he said.

However, something about his version of events didn't quite ring true for the NY Times' Japan correspondent Motoko Rich, who called the detail a "false note".

Twitter sleuths got on the case and found some… interesting evidence to the contrary.

First, there was Abe's education. The daughter of a wealthy family, she was educated at Tokyo's prestigious Sacred Heart School, where all students learn English as part of the curriculum.

Then there was her stint as an executive at Dentsu, the world's largest advertising and marketing agency - a role you would imagine might be difficult with no English skills whatsoever.

Then there was the time she delivered a keynote speech on Japan's coastal defences at a 2014 conference on natural disaster risk reduction.

Several people pointed out that Madame Abe was clearly reading from prepared notes rather than making a spontaneous address, making it hard to tell exactly how fluent she is when it comes to conversational English.

She certainly is capable of saying "hello", however, as evidenced by this clip of the Abes meeting the Obamas during a 2015 state visit to the US. As she climbs out of their car, Madame Abe greets President Obama and then speaks to Michelle Obama, with no translator in sight.

But then there was this clip of Abe and Melania Trump visiting a Japanese garden in Florida earlier this year. Although Abe is accompanied by an interpreter at the start of the footage, later she shares a laugh with Melania and also appears to understand their English-speaking tour guide.

While it's possible that Japan's first lady was merely nodding along to be polite, Twitter was nonetheless highly amused by the possibility that Abe pretended not to understand English to avoid speaking to Trump.

So what's the truth? Trump's belief that Abe spoke "zero" English was more likely a misunderstanding than a deliberate snub, says the Toronto Star, the result of "a convergence of Abe's limited English abilities and a desire not to misspeak". The Star cites multiple diplomatic sources who state that Abe definitely speaks some English, but is almost always accompanied by a translator in English-speaking environments, suggesting she is either not fluent or simply not comfortable using English.

Others wondered if Trump himself was to blame for the lack of scintillating conversation at the dinner table: