Minister of Simplification Roberto Calderoli of Italy
Roberto Calderoli is a leading member of the Northern League.
These comments drew many protests from the French embassy, the Italian Green Party (who said that Calderoli is "no better than the Ku Klux Klan") and the Party of Italian Communists among others.
Moreover, Calderoli said the centre-left government "would very probably have supported this France with no identity and the headbutts of Zidane.
In June 2008 Calderoli said in a TV interview: "It is obvious that there are ethnic groups and populations that are more inclined to work and others not.
Mr Calderoli was widely criticised by his cabinet colleagues for announcing earlier this week that he would distribute T-shirts emblazoned with the controversial cartoons.
Despite growing calls for his resignation - and facing blame for the riot in Libya on Friday that led to at least 10 deaths - Mr Calderoli was defiant, calling it a "battle for freedom.
Roberto Calderoli is a former doctor specialized in the maxillo-facial surgery.
Monday night, in a phone conversation with Ynet, Calderoli expressed disappointment at the situation in the Middle East pursuant to the Lebanon war, and from the anti-Israeli trend that he has sensed in his government.
Calderoli had voiced in an interview the need to "put an end to this story through a dialogue with these people.
Italy's Reform Minister Roberto Calderoli has had T-shirts made emblazoned with cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in a move that could embarrass Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's government.
A prominent Northern League official and former senator and minister, the 52-year-old Calderoli is controversial figure.
Italian minister Roberto Calderoli was expected to heed calls for him to resign Saturday after apparently provoking deadly protests in Libya by wearing a T-shirt deemed to be anti-Islamic.
Calderoli says he has the support of "many ordinary Italians" and even members of Foreign Minister Gianfranco Fini’s right wing National Alliance party.
This is not the first time that Calderoli has resigned.
The case of Calderoli is not a personal episode triggered by the uncontrollable behaviour of a bizarre personality, rather it is born out of the innate pathology of the league, wrote Eugenio Scalfari in the left-of-the-centre La Repubblica daily which he founded.
With this deplorable initiative, Calderoli has neither served his interest, nor that of his city, nor that of Italy, he said.
euro had brought such high prices.
all costs," Calderoli was quoted as saying Sunday in Rome daily La Repubblica.
as saying by the ANSA and Apcom news agencies.
I will send Bush my t-shirt'Calderoli was forced to resign his ministerial post in February for wear a shirt on which he had imprinted controversial Danish cartoons depicting Prophet Mohammad wearing a bomb-like turban.
Calderoli said in a statement he had quit out of a "sense of responsibility and certainly not because it was demanded by the government and the opposition.
ROME, Feb 15--Italys Reforms minister Roberto Calderoli has had T-shirts made emblazoned with cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) in a move that could embarrass Prime minister Silvio Berlusconis government, Reuters reported.
As for Berlusconi, seeing as he has compared himself to Jesus Christ, I would call on him to follow (Christs) example and think about evangelizing Christian values and not be evangelized by Islam, Calderoli was quoted as saying.
Calderoli was a minister in the previous centre-right government of Silvio Berlusconi when he sparked deadly riots in the former Italian colony after appearing on television wearing a T-shirt bearing a caricature of the Prophet Mohammed.
Calderoli is a key member of the right wing Northern League party which is likely to play a prominent role in Berlusconi's incoming coalition, following victory in last month's general elections.
Mr Calderoli has been the minister of reform since the Northern League's famously anti-immigration leader, Umberto Bossi, left the government for the European parliament last month.
Mr Calderoli said anyone "good or bad" trying to get into the country illegally should be "returned to sender" and anyone living illegally on Italian soil should be immediately expelled.
Returning as minister for "simplification" -- a new post without a full ministerial portfolio -- Calderoli was asked by Italian television about Libya's angry response to his appointment, and whether he regretted the T-shirt incident.
Since the T-shirt incident, Calderoli has continued to offend Muslims in Italy by protesting at the construction of new mosques and threatening "pig day" protests to defile them.
Calderoli is known for outbursts against immigrants and Muslims.
Calderoli has taken his campaign into the sewers.
Mr Calderoli has also threatened to defile the proposed site of a mosque in Padua by walking a pig over the ground.
Despite the controversies, which forced him to resign as a minister for reform in 2006, Mr Calderoli is likely to get another job when Mr Berlusconi picks his cabinet because of the strong results obtained by the Northern League in the general election.
ROME, Feb 16: Italys Reforms Minister Roberto Calderoli said on Wednesday he had been asked to resign after he had a T-shirt made emblazoned with the anti-Islam cartoons.
Calderoli said the shirts weren't meant to provoke Muslims, but instead to invite ``real dialogue.
It's time to stop making up stories about looking for dialogue with these people,'' Calderoli said on Feb 14.
Calderoli said it was ``hypocritical'' to distinguish between ``terrorist Islam and pacifist Islam.
I may even be sorry for the victims, but what happened in Libya has nothing to do with my T-shirt,'' Calderoli said in la Repubblica.
It seems to me Calderoli is a Churchill of our own times.
Calderoli is not even the leader of his party.
Calderoli is expression of a xenophobic movement.
If Calderoli has chosen any other moment, he wouldn't have been forced to resign.
Calderoli knows more about the Holy Roman Empires history than most of the American and British peoples do.
Calderoli is among four leading members of the anti-immigration Northern League, named by party leader Umberto Bossi as members of prime minister-elect Silvio Berlusconi's future cabinet.
Roberto Calderoli is a senior member of the Northern League, the party whose success in grabbing 8 per cent of the vote was the sensation of last week's general election.
Mr Calderoli was one of a clutch of Northern League leaders who will attain high office, according to the party's founder, Umberto Bossi.