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5/18/14

The Netherlands: Dutch racist Wilders targets Moroccans in EU campaign

A popular video on YouTube shows a dark-skinned young man trailing a suitcase through Dutch streets.

A popular Dutch Rapper Ali B also commented on the Wilders remarks.

"I'm going back to Morocco because they say we're not welcome any more," he tells people. "I want to say thanks for the 20 years that I've been allowed to stay in the Netherlands."

The clip, watched almost half a million times in the month since it was posted, is a TV satirist's response to a remark by Geert Wilders. The outspoken bleach-blond leader of the anti-immigration Dutch Freedom Party is one of leading anti-EU populists running in this month's European Parliament elections.

In a March speech in The Hague, Wilders - who has attracted supporters as far afield as the United States and Australia - asked the crowd if they wanted more or fewer Moroccans.

"Fewer! Fewer!" they chanted.

"Good. We'll arrange that," he said, smiling.

Criticised by some as invoking Nazi deportations of Jews during World War Two, the comment briefly hit his poll ratings. More than 5,000 complaints were filed calling for him to be prosecuted for hate speech and he lost several political allies.

But Wilders has bounced back and some of his American backers, after squirming, say they will stick by him.

About 18 percent of voters tell pollsters they will cast their ballots for his party in the EU-wide elections on May 22, ahead of the governing coalition Liberal and Labour parties and level with the centrist D66 party.

Wilders may command only minority support but his populism is a magnet for floating voters and he has set the tone of an increasingly harsh debate about immigration.

Read more: Dutch racist Wilders targets Moroccans in EU campaign | Europe | Worldbulletin News

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