04 March 2019
A racist death threat directed at a young Senegalese man has been described by the Italian interior minister Matteo Salvini as a request for "security and legality."
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The 22-year-old man, called Bakery, is from Senegal and is the adoptive son of an Italian family who live in Melagnano, in the Milan province.
They had already had to remove one piece of racist graffiti from the building in which they live. It invited them to "pay for these shitty negroes" and was seen as a reference to the costs of reception for new migrants.
The second piece of graffiti that appeared said "kill the negro" and had a swastika beneath the text.
Bakery's adoptive parents complained about the "atmosphere of a witch-hunt" that had been unleashed, blaming politicians and arguing that the interior minister should condemn the incident.
Salvini then intervened, saying: "I respect the pain of a mother, I embrace her son and condemn any form of racism."
He followed up on this point by adding that: "The lady must respect the request for security and legality that comes from Italians. Blocking vessel pilots and stopping illegal immigration is not racism but security."
The issue at hand, of course, was a racist death threat with a swastika to accompany it - but as far as Salvini is concerned, that is a "request for security and legality."
Source
Scritta razzista a Melegnano, la madre: "Politici fanno dell'immigrazione un problema", Milano Today, 21 February 2019
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