Friday, December 19, 2008

Vatican responds to accusations of failing to oppose Fascist anti-Semitic laws

The Vatican has accused Gianfranco Fini, the Speaker of the Italian Lower House of Parliament, of "shabby opportumism" for asserting that the Roman Catholic Church bears some responsibility for Fascist-era anti-Semitic laws.

Vatican Radio said Mr Fini's accusations were "unfounded".

L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, noted that Mr Fini, leader of the Alleanza Nazionale, had started his political career as a neo-Fascist, which made him a "political heir of Fascism".

He was guilty of "historical revisionism", the paper said, since the Fascist regime of Benito Mussolini bore sole responsibility for "the infamous racial laws of 1938."

At a ceremony in Parliament this week marking the 70th anniversary of the race laws Mr Fini said Italians in general as well as the Catholic Church had failed to oppose the laws, which restricted the rights of Jews, excluded them from government and universities and led to thousands of Italian Jews being sent to Nazi death camps.

Mr Fini, who has made Alleanza Nazionale a mainstream conservative party by jettisoning the Mussolini legacy and building bridges to Israel and Italian Jews, said the race laws, which aped the anti-Semitic laws of Nazi Germany, "represent one of this country's darkest moments".
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(Source: TTO)