🔗 Share this article

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

However, a live microphone situation captured Prabowo requesting Trump to arrange a call with his son Eric, both of whom hold positions at the Trump organization.

It represented only one in a series of missteps committed by international figures when they assume no one can hear them.

Below are five other noteworthy errors:

Transplant Procedures and Immortality

During a defense ceremony in Beijing this September, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin were overheard discussing organ transplants as a method for prolonging life.

"Human organs can be repeatedly replaced. The more you extend your life, the younger you become, and it's possible to even achieve immortality," the Russian translator was heard saying.

Xi, who was off camera, answered in Chinese: "Some predict 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'

Former Australian immigration minister Peter Dutton came under fire in 2015 when he made light about the situation of residents in the Pacific experiencing rising sea levels.

Dutton was speaking to former PM Tony Abbott, who had just returned from climate change talks with Pacific Island leaders in Port Moresby.

Noting that a migration discussion was running on "delayed schedule", Abbott responded: "We had a bit of that up in Port Moresby."

Dutton added: "Schedules become irrelevant when you're about to have the ocean reaching your home."

The comments sparked outrage from regional nations and environmentalists, while the opposition Labor party called for Dutton to issue an apology.

Peter Dutton recorded making jokes with Tony Abbott about coastal flooding

'Prejudiced Voter'

As Labour prime minister Gordon Brown was on the trail in 2010, he faced a constituent who questioned him on immigration and the economy.

Still wired up to a Sky news microphone when he got into his vehicle, Brown was heard saying: "That was a disaster – they should never have put me with that individual. Whose idea was that? Ridiculous."

When questioned about 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 Can't Stand Netanyahu. He Lies.'

Former US president Barack Obama was in conversation at the G20 summit in Cannes in 2011 with then French president Nicolas Sarkozy when their comments about Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu were picked up by a active recording device.

Sarkozy said: "I can't stand Netanyahu. He's a liar."

According to a version from a French interpreter cited by Reuters, Obama responded: "You're fed up with him but I must work with him frequently than you."

'Major League ***hole'

A vintage recording incident from then US presidential candidate George W. Bush happened as he made a negative comment about a reporter from The New York Times.

The GOP candidate was unaware that a recording device was active when he turned to Dick Cheney at a political event and remarked, "That's Adam Clymer, major league asshole from the New York Times."

Cheney answered: "Absolutely, he is, big time."

Bush at a political gathering in 2000