Geert Wilders anti-Islam movie gets House of Lords screening World headlines

Dutch far-right statesman Geert Wilders, who has described the Koran as a "fascist book", addresses a press discussion in London. Photograph: Ben Stansall/AFP/Getty Images

The argumentative far-right Dutch statesman Geert Wilders appeared at the House of Lords currently to shade an anti-Islam movie and malign the sacrament as "totalitarian" and exclusive with democracy.

The visit, that was creatively programmed for last year, sparked demonstrations from anti-fascists and a show of await from the far-right English Defence League.

Wilders, 46, who leads the Freedom party, was criminialized from the UK when Jacqui Smith was home secretary. She pronounced his participation had the intensity to "threaten village peace and thus open safety".

Wilders succeeded in removing the anathema overturned and told a press discussion that he had screened his movie in the Lords and discussed it thereafter in what he termed a "victory for leisure of speech".

"I had to discuss with people who disagreed with me and people who concluded with me," he said.

Wilders pronounced he had "nothing opposite Muslims whatsoever" but Islam was a "totalitarian religion".

"Islamism and democracy are incompatible. The some-more Islam we have, the some-more leisure we will lose and this is something value fighting for."

Wilders, whose movie describes the Koran as a nazi book, has perceived genocide threats for disapproval Islam and has been underneath close insurance for some-more than five years.

This afternoon he steady the views that have hurt Muslims in Europe and opposite the globe, observant Islam was a "fascist ideology", "a aroused and dangerous sacrament and a dense culture".

Wilders, who visited the Lords at the call in of the UK Independence celebration personality Lord Pearson and the crossbencher Baroness Cox, said: "Cultural relativism is the biggest disease we face in Europe today."

Lord Pearson pronounced that whilst he and Wilders – "a really good man" – concluded on most things he did not await his Dutch colleague"s enterprise for the Koran to be outlawed.

"If Geert is still job for the Koran to be criminialized similar to Mein Kampf afterwards I would not determine with him," he said. "[But] the Koran should be really most some-more discussed between the Muslim community."

When Wilders was asked either he would rivet with Muslims who reinterpreted their holy book in a demeanour some-more concordant with his views, he replied: "If you rip the horrible passages out of the Koran, you would get Donald Duck."

In any case, he said, Muslims would never desert the content of what he called "a distressing book".

Lord Pearson denied suggestions that Wilders"s revisit had been a broadside attempt written to woo those on the far right, observant it was a multi-party event.

Asked how most people had attended the eventuality in the Lords, he pronounced "about half a dozen", adding that he was not wakeful of any objections or boycotts.

Wilders was escorted from the press discussion as a throng of about 100 protesters from Unite Against Fascism (UAF) demonstrated opposite both his revisit and the participation circuitously of the far-right English Defence League, who had incited out to acquire the Dutch politician.

A large-scale military operation ensured that UAF and the EDL were kept well apart.

While the anti-fascists were fluttering placards celebration of the mass "EDL+BNP=Nazi extremist thugs" and chanting "EDL, go to hell, and take your Nazi friends as well", members of the joining were massing serve up the Thames outward Tate Britain.

When the English Defence League came to London. Link to this video

After watchful around for dual hours outward the art studio and in a circuitously pub, the 300 EDL demonstrators began marching towards Parliament Square only prior to 2.30pm.

Flanked by mounted officers and escorted by a thick military line, the EDL members wore shirts temperament the names of their groups – Glossop, Blackburn, Oldham, Stockport, Merseyside – and carried placards reading: "Gert [sic] Wilders, England Salutes You" and "England needs a Gert [sic]".

The point of the impetus appeared to have been lost on at slightest one EDL member. Spying a Dutch tricolour carried in salute to Wilders, he asked his associate demonstrators: "What you got a French dwindle for?"