Lega Nord MEP renowned for extremist views
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| Mario Borghezio is a controversial figure in Italian politics |
Borghezio is a member of Lega Nord, the party led by Umberto
Bossi that was set up originally to campaign for Italy to be broken up so that
the wealthy north of the country would sever its political and economic ties
with the poorer south.
He has been a Member of the European Parliament since 1999
and has served on several committees, including Civil Liberties, Justice and
Home Affairs and the Committee on Petitions.
He was even undersecretary to the Ministry of Justice from
1994-95.
Yet he had regularly espoused extremist and racist views, to
the extent that even the right-wing British party UKIP, with whom he developed
strong links, moved to distance themselves from him over one racist outburst.
It was at their behest that he was expelled from the
European Parliament’s Europe of Freedom and Democracy group after making racist
remarks about Cecile Kyenge, Italy’s first black cabinet minister, whom he said
was more suited to being a housekeeper and claimed would impose “African tribal
conditions” in Italy.
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| Borghezio's outspoken views have landed him in trouble during his career |
It was not the first time Borghezio’s outspoken views had
landed him in trouble. In fact, he has a
charge sheet stretching back to 1993, when he was ordered to pay a 750,000 lire
fine for violence against a minor when he apprehended an 12-year-old unlicensed Moroccan street seller and forcibly restrained him while waiting for the
police.
Subsquently, he was sentenced to two months and 20 days in
prison in 2005 for setting fire to the pallets on which some migrants were
sleeping in Turin, although this was commuted to a €3,040 fine.
In 2007 he was arrested by Belgian police for participating
in protest against what he claimed was the "Islamisation of Europe", while in 2011 he was accused of promoting racial hatred when he criticised those who brought the Bosnian war
criminal Ratko Mladic to justice for denying him the opportunity “to halt the
advance of Islam into Europe” through his genocide of Muslim men.
Later in the same year, he was suspended, albeit only
temporarily, by his party, Lega Nord, for praising some of the ideas in the manifesto
of Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian anti-Islam extremist who a week
earlier had killed eight people in a car bomb attack in Oslo before slaying 69
members of the Norwegian Labour Party’s youth division in a gun rampage at a
summer camp two hours later.
Borghezio remains a member of Lega Nord and an MEP.
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| Turin is famous for its arcaded streets |
Turin, the one-time capital of Italy, is best known for its
royal palaces but tends to be overshadowed by other cities such as Rome,
Florence, Milan and Venice when it comes to attracting tourists. Yet there is much to like about a stay in
Turin, from its many historic cafés to 12 miles of arcaded streets and some of
the finest restaurants in Piedmont, yet because visitors do not flock to Turin
in such large numbers prices tend to be a little lower than in Rome and Florence and
Venice.
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| Turin's Piazza San Carlo |
To enjoy Turin’s historic cafés,
head for Via Po, Turin’s famous promenade linking Piazza Vittorio Veneto with Piazza Castello, where it is impossible to walk more
than a few metres without coming to a café, or a pasticceria, or nearby Piazza San
Carlo, one of the city’s main squares. Inside, it is still possible to imagine
the revolutionary atmosphere that swept through the haunts of writers and
artists in the 19th century. Philosophers and writers such as Friedrich Nietzsche
and Alexandre Dumas, the composers Puccini and Rossini, the politician Cavour
and the poet Cesare Pavese all discussed the affairs of the day in these famous
coffee houses.