Figure 12 – Extrapolated sum of bilateral meetings between EU leaders, as reported on Twitter

In this case, therefore, 18 EU leaders would have held bilateral interactions with 10 or more EU leaders (4 of which with 20 or more), and only 7 would have had only 5 or fewer interactions with their peers. This also shows a number of changes in the ranking, with for example Charles Michel now coming second in the number of meetings and Sebastian Kurz changing from position ten to position three, which he shares with Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Juha Sipilä. However, extrapolating the data for EU leaders who did not hold office for the full 18 months tends to distort the comparison, in so far as EU leaders would not have continued the same rate of contact over a longer period of time. Charles Michel provides a good example in this respect: he held many bilateral meetings towards the end of his premiership, due to the fact that he was contacting many EU leaders in preparation for his new position as European Council President. Consequently, a comparison of only those EU leaders who were in office during the full 18-month period under observation is more accurate.