Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi, on a visit to Rome, said on Monday the EU should pay Libya “at least 5 billion euros a year” to stop clandestine immigration and avoid a “black Europe.”
Qaddafi’s visit to mark the second anniversary of a friendship treaty with Italy had already stumbled into controversy after he said Europe should convert to Islam.
Speaking at a ceremony on Monday standing next to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, Qaddafi said his plan to “put an end to” illegal immigration was backed by Italy, but Berlusconi stayed silent.
Backing Libya’s request for cash would be in the interests of Europe, which otherwise “tomorrow, with the advance of millions of immigrants, could become [another] Africa,” Qaddafi said.
Libya “is the entry door for unwanted immigration” that should be “stopped at the Libyan borders,” he said.
“Tomorrow Europe might no longer be European and even black as there are millions [of Africans] who want to come in,” Qaddafi argued, describing the migratory movements as “something very dangerous.”
“We don’t know what will happen, what will be the reaction of the white and Christian Europeans faced with this influx of starving and ignorant Africans,” the Libyan leader said.
“We don’t know if Europe will remain an advanced and united continent or if it will be destroyed as happened with the barbarian invasions,” he added.=
However, Qaddafi insisted: “There is also desirable immigration. There are Libyans who have money and I encourage them to come to Italy to invest.”
In earlier controversial comments, Qaddafi said on Sunday that Europe should convert to Islam during a lecture to a group of 500 young women hired and paid by an agency to attend his lecture.
“Islam should become the religion of all of Europe,” one of the women quoted Qaddafi as saying in the Italian press.
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