Journalist Helle Laing, who was at the center of a row with Indian diplomats during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Norway, has denied that she walked out of a press conference where an Indian foreign ministry official delivered a long response to her question about alleged human rights violations.
“I just need a glass of water,” she said sharply.
She was responding to a topic on X website that featured a video of her confronting Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (West) Sibi George with her questions.
In this topic, one user wrote: “Why did you do that? [Helle Lyng] Leaves? A does not know [expletive] About India and wants to question an IFS officer. “She actually wants to be a podcaster, so she needs a following.”
That’s when she made it clear she wasn’t going out. The user (@GaneshMhz) then responded by tagging human rights activist Great Thunberg: “That’s a reasonable excuse. Water can calm you down a little. You’re acting like Greta.”
Responds to multiple X posts on ‘exit’
Another user (@Albela_Yogi) posted, “The Norwegian press asks questions and then goes out to the café or the bathroom, without caring to hear back. With such a toxic sense of entitlement, it’s no wonder the Norwegian press is supposedly first place in the World Press Freedom Index.”
She responded to this handle: “We were talking for a while and he did not address human rights violations even though I asked several times to be more specific.”
In response to a comment that “MEA won this round” and that “the walkout is not an act of journalism but shows angry activity”, Hailey Laing wrote: “I was just getting water and came back… Thank you for your perspective.”
She explained in another response: “We were talking for a while and he did not address human rights violations, even though I asked several times to be more specific.”
He asked Prime Minister Modi to take questions
The row started after she objected to not holding a proper press conference with a question and answer session during Prime Minister Modi’s joint press conference with his Norwegian counterpart Jonas Gahr Sture on Monday.
Helly Ling on X shared a video of PM Modi coming out of the joint statement venue and said in the caption that PM Modi did not take her question.
“I wasn’t expecting that from him,” she said in the post, sharing the video in which a woman, apparently Ling, can be heard saying: “Why don’t you take some questions from the freest press in the world?”
She also wrote on the
At a subsequent Indian ministry briefing, where reporters pressed officials about the prime minister’s failure to take questions, the MEA’s Sibi George engaged in a tense exchange with her.
She asked “why should we trust you” about alleged human rights violations and lack of press freedom in India.
She also wondered whether the Prime Minister “will start taking critical questions from the Indian press.”
In response, Middle East Affairs (West) Minister Sibi George gave a summary of ‘What is India’.
Let me give a background on what India is… What is a country? The state today has four elements. One, population, two governments, third sovereignty, and fourth territory. So, this is what makes a state a state. We are proud…that we are a civilizational country that is 5,000 years old. Continuous civilization, continuous civilization. “I have contributed greatly to the world.”
While narrating everything that came from India, George can be seen asking someone to let him answer the question without interruption. “Please don’t interrupt me,” said a clearly exasperated George, as his response extended for several minutes.
Also in X, BJP IT cell chief Amit Malviya claimed. He added: “The Norwegian Prime Minister also did not take any questions at the joint press conference of the two leaders.”
Helle Ling also responded to this: “He did, but only to the Norwegian press at first. He met the Indian press later that day.
In his post, Malviya also said that Opposition Leader Rahul Gandhi, who had mocked the Prime Minister over the row, and his “crazy Congress ecosystem” were “flaunting the incoherent statements of a crooked journalist”.
The Congress pointed out that Modi as Prime Minister did not deliver any press conference during his 12-year tenure and counting.
