European Economic Affairs Commissioner Pierre Moscovici should not "dare" to call Italy's governing parties "little Mussolinis", Deputy Premier Luigi Di Maio said Thursday - while fellow populist Deputy Premier Matteo Salvini said the commissioner should "wash his mouth out before insulting Italy". Moscovici had said earlier that the rise of European populists showed that "today there is a climate that very much resembles the 1930s. Certainly, we must not exaggerate, clearly there isn't Hitler, perhaps little Mussolinis".
Di Maio, leader of the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement (M5S), said "the attitude from some European commissioners is unacceptable, really intolerable.
"They dare to say that in Italy there are many little Mussolinis, they should not dare!".
The M5S is allied in government with the anti-migrant Euroskeptic League party of Interior Minister and Deputy Premier Salvini.
Both parties have been dubbed populist, a label they do not disdain.
Moscovici should "wash his mouth out" before talking about "little Mussolinis wandering Europe" in the form of new populist leaders, Salvini said Thursday.
"Instead of censuring his France that pushed back migrants at Ventimiglia, bombed Libya and broke European parameters, he attacks Italy and mouths off about the many little Mussolinis wandering Europe," said Salvini.
"Let him wash his mouth out before insulting Italy, the Italians and their legitimate government," said Salvini.
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