Turkey on Thursday lashed out at Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi's "ugly" comparison of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to a tyrant. Draghi on Thursday accused Erdogan of being a dictator for holding a summit with the EU's two top leaders in which European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen ended up without a chair. Turkish officials rejected blame for the episode, insisting that they were following the protocol instructions they had received from the EU. The Turkish foreign ministry immediately summoned the Italian ambassador to Ankara to protest Draghi's remarks, in which he said von der Leyen had been subjected to "humiliation" by the Turks. "We strongly condemn the unacceptable populist remarks, and the ugly and unreasonable comments made by the appointed Italian Prime Minister Draghi," Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu tweeted. Omer Celik, the spokesman for Erdogan's ruling AK Party, said he "regretted" Draghi's comments because they do "not reflect the depth of Turkish-Italian relations". raz/zak/har