Italian Official Quits in Strife Over Cartoons
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/19/international/europe/19cartoon.html
TURIN, Italy, Feb. 18 — A day after at least 11 people
were killed in Libya amid continuing violence over the
Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, an Italian
government minister resigned Saturday for wearing a
T-shirt printed with the cartoons.
The protesters in Libya, angry over the minister's T-shirt,
had stormed an Italian Consulate in Benghazi on Friday and
were fired on by Libyan soldiers. Here in Italy, critics of
Roberto Calderoli, the reforms minister who showed off his
T-shirt on television earlier this week, blamed him for the
violence — and even his own political allies, including
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, demanded his resignation.
Mr. Calderoli belongs to a far-right party, the Northern League,
that is small but influential. It is a key member of Mr. Berlusconi's
center-right ruling coalition.
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Cartoon Protests Leave 15 Dead in Nigeria
http://www.cumberlink.com/articles/2006/02/18/ap/headlines/d8frq2f80.txt
MAIDUGURI, Nigeria - Nigerian Muslims protesting caricatures
of the Prophet Muhammad attacked Christians and burned churches
on Saturday, killing at least 15 people in the deadliest
confrontation yet in the whirlwind of Muslim anger over
the drawings.
In Libya, the parliament suspended the interior minister
after at least 11 people died when his security forces
attacked rioters who torched the Italian consulate in Benghazi.
Right-wing Italian Reforms Minister Roberto Calderoli
resigned under pressure, accused of fueling the fury
in Benghazi by wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with one
of the offending cartoons, first published nearly five
months ago in a Danish newspaper.
Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi blamed the riots in Libya,
Italy's former colony, on "thoughtless action by our minister,"
the Italian news agency ANSA quoted him as saying.
Calderoli said he wore the shirt to show "solidarity to
all those who were hit by the blind violence of religious
fanaticism." He said he did not intend "to offend the
Muslim religion nor to be the pretext for yesterday's violence."
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Political spectrum
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_spectrum
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I wish I'd looked before I leaped, I didn't know it was so deep,
'been down so far I don't get wet, I haven't touched the bottom yet
What a way to spend the night, if I don't drown I'll tie of fright,
my pappy taught me how to float but I can't swim a single note.
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