BRUSSELS — Top European leaders attending a NATO summit in Ankara were given engraved pistols and live ammunition as a leaving gift.
The elaborate firearms — and accompanying bullets and cleaning kit — were presented to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President António Costa on Wednesday by the host, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, two EU officials confirmed to POLITICO.
A European Council official added that Costa’s security team took the weapon for checks. “We will follow the Belgian procedures to bring it to Belgium and then we will store it in line with the security requirements imposed by the General Secretariat of the Council,” they said.