Italian’s slur target promised flowers

ROME — The vice president of Italy’s Senate rejected calls for his resignation Tuesday for making a racial slur against Italy’s first black Cabinet minister, but he said he was sorry and would send her flowers to make amends.

Roberto Calderoli, a leader of the anti-immigration Northern League, has been criticized by Italy’s president, premier and a host of ministers and lawmakers for comparing the Congolese-born integration minister, Cecile Kyenge, to an orangutan.

Premier Enrico Letta’s Democratic Party called for his resignation, and the premier himself warned the league to put an end to such attacks or risk a political confrontation.

Kyenge has been targeted by racial slurs from the Northern League since she was named integration minister in Letta’s government in April. One Northern League politician has called her a Congolese “monkey,” and another has said she deserved to be raped.

Calderoli said at a league rally over the weekend that when he thought of Kyenge, an orangutan came to mind.

Calderoli on Tuesday asked the Senate to accept his apologies and said he would have resigned had a majority of Senate leaders asked for it. But he said no such majority had formed. Letta’s Democrats don’t control the Senate.

He said Kyenge had accepted his apologies, and Calderoli said he would follow the suggestion of colleagues by sending her a bouquet of flowers.