(see related)
Agriculture Minister Francesco
Lollobrigida referred to the need to protect Italian culture and
"ethnicity" during an address at a conference on Rome on Italy's
declining birth rate on Thursday.
"I think it is clear to everyone that an Italian race does not
exist," Lollobrigida said at the Natality States General (Stati
Generali della Natalità) conference.
"It is a fake problem to imagine a concept of this kind.
"However, an Italian culture, ethnicity, what the Treccani
dictionary defines as a cultural, linguistic group, does exist
and I imagine it is what this conference seeks to protect, .
"Otherwise, it would have no sense.
"The world's population is growing and many of those who are
born around the world would like to come and live in Italy.
"So why worry about births in Italy?
"If the answer is to increase the birth rate, it is probably
linked to the defence of that (sense of) belonging which many
people are attached to, me in particular, to what is the Italian
culture, to our language family, to our way of life".
Lollobrigida, who is a senior member of Premier Giorgia
Meloni's right-wing Brothers of Italy (FdI) party. came under
heavy fire last month for saying that Italy's low birth rate
meant Italians risked enduring "ethnic replacement" by migrants.
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